SatanoSnakes
by gigatronthepwn
Summary: This is the harrowing tale of giant demonic snake monsters slithering amok in Tellius. C'mon, there's romance! Don't you want to read it just for the romance? Hector is in it! Hector in Tellius! With snakes! Still not interested?
1. Author

**FOREWORD**

Most writers, especially aspiring writers such as myself, would rather not waste their talents writing fan fiction. They'd rather create their own wondrous fantasy worlds rather than pay tribute to the wondrous fantasy worlds created by others. And yet, here I am, writing a foreword for a fan fic I finished writing a month ago. I guess that would be somewhat excusable if this were a normal pairing/parody fic, but instead, it's a violent monster mash in the vein of _Tremors_ and _Return of the Living Dead _set in the medieval fantasy world of the video game series _Fire Emblem_. Pardon my French, but that's just bat-shit crazy.

Perhaps there's some hidden symbolism in the awkward interspecies love affair between Ike and Lethe that deep down, we all can somehow relate to. Haven't all guys in college or high school ever met a girl that they had a huge crush on, but it was so painfully obvious that having a relationship with her simply wouldn't work for either of them? Granted, that girl probably wasn't a part-feline shape shifter, but I digress. Maybe deep down we can identify with Soren as he is tempted by a giant vampiric snake demon to murder his best friend's love interest for nothing in return. Maybe we can relate with Hector as he laments that it wasn't his axe that directly killed one of the monsters, even this his axe did, by extension, cause the creature's demise.

Or maybe this is just the weirdest flipping fan fic you're ever going to lay eyes on. Either way, the inspiration for _Basilisk's Reign _is ambiguous. What possessed me to pit Ike, Ephraim, and Eliwood against the Serpentine Xenomorph-Wannabe Club from Hell? Perhaps it was just the flames of youthful creativity burning out of control? Quite possibly. Heck, more than likely.

Again, I digress. If you find this story hard to get through, try this: When Ashnard the Giant Snake Zombie is going all _War of the Worlds _on Malthrowin, or when Grave Digger (the giant centipede formally known as Sir Oswin of Ostia) is bursting out of the ground in pursuit of Lethe and the Elibiens like that scorpion thing from _Transformers_, just imagine those as anime-style cut scenes from an actual _Fire Emblem _game and all the action scenes as the turn-based combat sequences trademark of _FE_.

I just realized what an awesome movie this fic would make. It would be the first ever brainless entertainment monster flick done as anime! No. Forget that. Forget I ever said that and just read the dang story.

**UPDATE: By the way, its called _SATANO-SNAKES _now. Just because I'm stark raving mad.**


	2. Chapter 1

This is but a short teaser. DISCLAIMER: I am nowhere near awesome enough to own Fire Emblem. The rights to this crazy cool game series belongs to Nintendo and Intelligent Systems.

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Myth and legend tell of many brave heroes. Myth and legend also tell of many foul monsters for these heroes to fight. Thesus and the Minotaur, Beowulf and Grendal, Bellophone and Chimera, to name a few. But there is one tale that only the most knowledgeable of scholars and mythologists know of.

This is the tale of Ike and the Basilisk.

A long time ago, in a land called Tellius, where two races known as the Beorc and the Laguz lived in constant turmoil, there lived a monster. His name was King Ashnard of Daein. Ashnard committed unspeakable crimes against Beorc and Laguz alike. But then, one day, a hero, General Ike of Crimea put an end to the mad king's reign of terror. Tellius was free from his oppression.

But the world would not forget King Daein so easily. In Ashnard's dying moments, he made a deal. A deal with the dark god he set out to free and in doing so drown the realm in chaos. This deal was that one year after his defeat at Ike's hand, he would return to the world of the living to seek revenge. But he would not return to this world as he left. He would return as a great and terrifying beast with a constant hunger for blood and an unquenchable thirst to kill.

Ike would have to gather his strength and allies to drive this new evil back to the hellish underworld from whence it came. Warriors from distant lands would come to his aid. But would this be enough?

That is a discovery for you, reader, to discover.


	3. Chapter 2

A lone figure walked through the sunlit garden of Castle Crimea. A young man with a flowing red cape and scruffy blue hair walked among the sweet-smelling rose bushes and oak trees, set to the tune of robins and sparrows chirping in the tree branches. His clothes were that of a common sellsword. To most eyes he would seem unfit to roam freely in such a place of royalty. But this was no common mercenary; this was Ike, commander of the Greil Mercenaries and the saviour of the entire continent of Tellius. Soon, a light green-haired woman clad in an elegant orange dress came out to meet Ike. This was Queen Elincia, the one who had called her champion to Crimea Garden.

"I am glad to see that you could arrive so quickly," the queen said with a sweet smile, "I have a very important task for you."

"What would you have me do, your Majesty?" Ike asked. Elincia giggled a bit.

"Oh please, Ike, we've known each other too long for those kinds of pleasantries!" she told him.

"Well, you ARE Queen now. I only figured that I should pay you the proper respect." Ike replied with a slight smile.

"I suppose so. Now about the task. It seems Tellius was not the only continent spared in the great flood. We have received word from two other lands, Magvel and Elibe. Prince Ephraim and his sister Princess Erika of Magvel, and the nobles Lord Eliwood and Lord Hector of Elibe have agreed to come to Tellius."

Two other continents were saved from a watery grave? This greatly interested Ike. Many centuries ago an evil god attempted to drown the entire world in a great flood. Until now the people of Tellius believed their land was the only one saved by the Goddess. It seemed now that the Goddess hadn't only smiled on Tellius during the dark god's reign.

"So what is my mission, your Highness?" Ike asked. Elincia giggled again.

"Ike, please!"

"What, I can't say that either? Again, Elincia, you're the queen of Crimea." Ike reminded her. "As a Crimean citizen I think I should call my ruler 'Majesty' or 'Highness' or other such important-sounding things."

"If you insist! Your objective is simply to meet our guests at the harbour. Perhaps Ranulf should accompany you?"

"Have you told them about the laguz, yet?"

"Yes, I have mentioned them and explained a bit about them. Still, it should help if one of the first citizens of Tellius they meet is laguz."

Tellius was inhabited by two races: Beorc, normal humans, and Laguz, shape-shifting animal people. The two races were constantly at each other's throats, although Queen Elincia worked diligently to bring them together in peace and equality. Ranulf was a good friend of Ike's.

"Good idea. I'll talk to him about it." Ike agreed. Just then, another man, this one a bit taller than Ike, clad in green armor and with light blue hair, walked up next to Elincia. "Geoffrey! How are you?"

"Never been better! How are _you_?" Geoffrey returned Ike's greeting.

Elincia's smiled faded as she took a deep breath. "Ike, I have something I need to tell you." She said disdainfully. "I know we've had some tender moments, and that we've been through a lot together, but... Me and Geoffrey... We're something of an item now."

Then, as if to drive the point home, Elincia and Geoffrey began kissing passionately. Right there in the garden. Right in front of Ike and at least a half dozen servants.

"...Right... Well, I guess I'll go speak to Ranulf now..." Ike said awkwardly. "How soon do you think our guests will be arriving?" Elincia ignored him. "Very well, pay me no mind..." Ike turned on his heel and left the castle grounds.


	4. Chapter 3

The sea was calm, and a cool breeze swept through the salty air. Seagulls squawked in the sky above, but there were only two men on the deck to witness this pleasant scene. One man was a giant encased in blue armour, the same colour as his slicked-back hair, with a massive axe propped on his shoulder. The other was a fair bit smaller, with red hair and the garb of a Pherae noble. The giant was Hector, and the red-head was Eliwood.

"So when do we reach this Tellisus?" Hector asked his diminutive friend.

"Tellius. Probably by nightfall." Eliwood answered.

"A bit sooner than I expected," Hector added in a slightly relieved tone. "So what about these... Oh, what were they called again, Lagurz or something like that? Those animal folk Elincia mentioned."

"Laguz. I'm actually quite looking forward to meeting one. It should be interesting."

Another man, still dwarfed by Hector with brown hair and a goofy smile on his face at all times, clad in green armour, sauntered up beside Eliwood, having heard their conversation. This was Sain.

"Ah yes, speaking about the inhabitants of Tellius?" Sain piped up. "Well, the Laguz women of Tellius shall always know that they have a friend in Elibe!"

"I'm sure they will, Sain. But for all you know, they could be all hairy and have whiskers and claws and such. Will they still have a friend in you?" asked another person who had decided to come up on deck and join the discussion. This was Matthew, the resident thief. A red cloak hid most of his small form, and his head was adorned with messy light brown hair.

Sain thought for a moment. "Well, it really depends what's past the hair and claws." He finally replied. Just then, two more behemoths like Hector lumbered onto the deck behind Matthew. One was covered from the chin down in orange armor with hair like Matthew's, only a bit more kept. This was Hector's guardian Oswin. The other was clad in gold-and-red armor with a soul patch beard and orchid hair. This was Marcus, Eliwood's sworn protector.

"Good news. The captain says we should be arriving at Crimea Harbor in four or five hours with this tail wind. Much sooner than nightfall, at any rate," announced Marcus.

"Excellent. Thank you for the update, Marcus," said Eliwood.

"And you, Oswin?" asked Hector.

"I just wanted to stretch my legs." Oswin replied.

"Very well, then. So I suppose all the ship crew are going to come up now and join in on our chat." Hector said sarcastically.

"They might just do that." Eliwood chuckled. "So why didn't Lyn join us on this endeavour?"

"Lady Lyndis insisted that there were some things in Sacae that needed sorting out." Sain announced.

"Ah yes. Now, why didn't you stay with her?" Hector questioned.

"Did you not hear the first words out of my mouth when I joined you two?" Sain asked mischievously.

"But of course. You want some tail." Matthew said, rolling his eyes. Sain's smile faded a little.

"Not that there's anything wrong with you coming along, Sain," Eliwood added quickly, "just please don't flirt _too _much." As Eliwood finished his sentence, one last addition to the team joined them. This one had short black hair and wore a scruffy green robe; Mark, the tactician.

"Look who finally decided to rejoin us in the land of the living!" Hector exclaimed upon seeing Mark.

"I had some mead to sleep off, remember," said Mark. "What did I miss?"

"Not much. Just a bit of conversation," said Matthew. "Remind me why we need a tactician for our visit to Tellius?"

Eliwood shrugged. "He wanted to come along, and I was feeling gracious," the young lord replied. Matthew approached Mark and bent in close to him.

"Try to stay away from Sain while in the pubs," the thief whispered into the tactician's ear, "He's going to be trying to score himself some furries." With that, Matthew went back into the ship's cabin.


	5. Chapter 4

Prince Ephraim looked out onto the rolling waves crashing against the bow of the _Stellar Wasp_. The vessel flew the flag of Magvel, which waved and flapped in the wind. Ephraim's sky blue hair was rustled a little by the cool gusts. His sister, Princess Erika soon joined him. The two were twins, easily recognizable as siblings.

"Brother," said Erika, "you look troubled. Is something bothering you?" The prince shrugged.

"Not really, no," Ephraim answered, "I guess I'm just a bit anxious."

Seth, a tall, handsome figure only a few years older than the two young royals he was sworn to protect with hair as red as flames stood behind Erika, looking out onto the water as Ephraim did. "Nice weather today, isn't it?" said the paladin.

"Yes, quite," agreed the princess.

"Indeed. So will the Queen herself be greeting us in Crimea or will it be one of her couriers?" Ephraim asked.

"I believe General Ike will be meeting us," Seth answered.

"Ah yes, the saviour of Tellius. That should be interesting," said the prince.

"I thought the Queen said some representatives of the Laguz nations would be meeting us as well," Erika added, "was that not the case?"

"I believe that is the case as well," replied Seth.

"I've been a bit curious about the Laguz. I've tried to find some books in the library back at Castle Renais on them, but of course that was a doomed effort," Erika said with a small smile, "Tellius and Magvel have been completely unaware of each other until now, so we in Magvel would know nothing of the Laguz, I guess."

"Hm. They should be interesting as well," Ephraim speculated.

"I suppose I should go down to the quarters and see how everyone is doing," Seth announced.

"I'll come with you. This salt air is a bit much for me," said Erika. The princess and the paladin went back down into the ships' cabin, leaving the prince alone, looking out onto the sprawling ocean.


	6. Chapter 5

Another cranberry bush was picked clean. Kara's fingers could get a berry no matter where it tried to hide in the bush. Her basket was now full. Time to head back to the village. Looking up from her work, Kara's eyes scanned the snow-covered forest. Right now she was on the border between Crimea and Daein. As a Crimean citizen, Kara knew that any Daeins that happened upon her wouldn't take too kindly to her presence. Partially because she was Crimean, but mostly because she was Laguz, as indicated by her cat-like ears, tail, and facial stripes on her cheeks. What her eyes, ears, and nose searched for was irate Daeins. Surely they couldn't hide from her acute senses.

Kara's family had moved from Gallia, home of the Beast Tribe Laguz, to aid in restoring Crimea to its former glory. Currently, Crimea was the only place in Tellius where Beorc and Laguz lived together in harmony and equality. Kara was 12 going on 13 when she arrived in Crimea, and now was 14. Needless to say, even in her animal form she wasn't very good at all at defending herself. If only her father or older brother could have accompanied her for protection. Or maybe she just shouldn't have gone so close to the Daein border. Either would've ensured Kara a bit more safety.

Pulling the hood of her woolen coat over her head, Kara finally began her trek through the snow and trees back to her family's cottage nearby. She had only started walking when she froze dead in place. A strange scent had wafted into her nostrils. A scent that nearly made her retch. A scent like corpses rotting in the sun. Then came a rumbling noise in the distance. Slowly, cautiously, Kara turned around, and stared at the frozen plane before her. She stared long and hard. Had she just seen a hump rise in the snow for a moment before falling back down? No, surely her eyes were deceiving her. But her nose and ears weren't There was something rumbling in the distance, and something reeked of death.

Then, the rumbling began to grow slowly, but steadily louder, and another hump rose, this one closer and larger a well. Kara was curious now. But the stench was becoming overpowering. The hump and the rumbling were now quickly moving towards her. As soon as this sudden curiosity came, it left, and was replaced by fear. Kara whipped around and ran as fast as her legs could carry her. The snow and low-hanging tree branches slowed her, and she couldn't go into her animal form for risk of her young age and inexperience causing her to suddenly revert back to human form, slowing her down even more.

All Kara could do was run. Run and hope this rumbling hump in the snow that stunk of death would leave her alone.

But it didn't.

Instead, it only began chasing her faster, now causing snow to shoot up into the cold air as it came after the girl.

Then, a fallen branch caught Kara's foot. She tripped, scattering frozen cranberries all over the ground and filling the air with her shrill scream.

This scream would be the last sound to echo through the trees before screeching and ripping replaced it.

Quails and pheasants plucked frozen cranberries out of the snow. There was silence in the woods as the hump slowly slunk away before falling into the ground and out of sight. Then ravens began to descend among the quails and pheasants. They weren't after the cranberries, however. They hungered for a small body wrapped in a woolen coat, laying deathly still in the frost.


	7. Chapter 6

The Gallian forest was warm and muggy. It didn't help that Ike had Ranulf to keep up with either. The blue cat had surged ahead of his friend, as if this were a race were something significant awaited him at the finish line. Another thing that didn't help matters was Elincia and Geoffrey's kiss replaying over and over again in Ike's mind. At last Ranulf stopped and gave Ike a moment to catch up.

"Something's wrong, I can tell," said Ranulf as Ike approached him, "what's up?"

"What if there was a woman, a woman you loved with all your heart, and you thought she felt the same way about you," Ike explained, "at least, until she started practically making love to another man right before your eyes?"

"Her Majesty and Geoffrey, eh?" Ranulf replied.

"How did you know?"

"I found out more or less the same way you did. The Queen begged and pleaded me not to tell you, but it seems Geoffrey couldn't care less who knew."

The two now walked beside each other as Ranulf went into his human form.

"So this has been going on for a while?" Ike asked.

"Quite a while," Ranulf answered before he made a face like he just remembered something. "By the way, hadn't you promised Lethe that you'd come train with her here in Gallia after the war?"

"I'm getting around to it. I still have a mercenary company to lead." Replied the Beorc.

"She's getting a bit impatient," the Laguz added.

"Well then, I guess I'd better hurry up and make time for her, hadn't I?" Ike laughed dryly.

"Her sister would also like to meet you."

"Lethe has a sister?" This was news to Ike.

"Indeed she does. Her name's Lyre. She's really quite looking forward to your visit. Apparently Lethe talks to her about you all the time," Ranulf explained.

"I'll take that as a compliment, coming from Lethe. So about these nobles and royals arriving at the harbor..." Ike changed the subject.

"Yes, about them. Do we know anything about them other than their names and where they're from?"

"Not that I know of. Eliwood and Hector of Elibe, Ephraim and Erika of Magvel..."

"Sounds like a fun group!" Ranulf said half-jokingly. "So who all is going to be at the greeting party?"

"You and me, of course. I'm guessing Janaff and Ulki will be there representing Phoenicis. I think Prince Goldoa will make an appearance. I suspect Kilvas will want nothing to do with it."

"Huh... Here I thought both Goldoa and Kilvas would want to avoid visitors," Ranulf speculated.

"It seems the Black Dragon King has had a change of heart," said Ike. "We should hurry. They'll probably arrive by nightfall."


	8. Chapter 7

WARNING: ULKI ABUSE. IF YOU LIKE ULKI, SKIP THIS CHAPTER.

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Two hawks flew over the woods. One had tan, almost blond feathers, the other reddish brown. The blond one was Janaff, the eyes of the hawk king Tibarn, and his companion Ulki, the hawk king's ears. Both had highly acute senses, as indicated by their titles. As Ike speculated, they were on their way to Crimea Harbor to represent Phoenicis, the hawk nation. Suddenly, Ulki snapped to attention. His impeccable hearing had detected something. Rumbling. Something under the ground below them.

"There's movement in the forest," Ulki announced, "something in the ground moving opposite our direction."

"Huh... You're hearing something weird, and I'm seeing something weird," said Janaff, referring to the gaping hole in the ground he spied in a clearing in the forest not too far ahead of them. "That means there's obviously something weird going on here!"

"...I assume you see something?" asked Ulki.

"Oh yeah, I didn't tell you, did I? There's a big hole in the snow up ahead," replied Janaff, "shall we investigate?"

"Remember, Janaff, we have to be at the harbor soon. I don't think we have time for this."

"Aw, c'mon, Ulki! Maybe it's something important that the boss should know about?" By 'the boss", Janaff was referring to Tibarn the hawk king.

"Hm... Well, when you put it that way, I suppose we could take a moment to look into it."

Once the hole came into Ulki's vision, the two hawks descended to the frost-covered ground below. The pit, about twenty feet wide and thirty feet deep, was surrounded by what looked like hundreds of claw marks, all of which about four of five inches thick. Clearly something with plenty of large claws had dug this hole. At the bottom of the abyss was what looked like a tunnel through the permafrost.

"Odd... Very odd indeed," said Ulki after a brief silence. The two landed and shifted into their human forms. Ulki was noticeably older than Janaff, with his constantly-narrowed eyes and brown robes. Janaff was a bit feminine, clad in garb that somewhat resembled something a medieval boy scout would wear. Their hair color in human form matched the color of their feathers in hawk form. The duo peered into the hole intently.

"It looked a bit more interesting in the air," Janaff lamented.

"Still, I hear the rumbling of something moving under the ground, so whatever made this is still out there," Ulki deduced. "I don't think his Majesty should be bothered with this. Queen Elincia should be notified, since this is on her land."

"Good call. Shall we inform her after our business at the harbor?" asked the younger hawk.

"Let's. Speaking of which, we should continue with our original goal," said his elder companion.

"Another good call," agreed Janaff.

"Wait... The rumbling's getting louder. It's coming this way!" exclaimed Ulki. They both changed into their hawk forms and took flight.

But they were a fraction of a second too late.

A long, thin tendril surged out of the hole and grabbed the nearest airborne object; Ulki's leg! Then another tendril sprang out and grabbed Ulki's wing. Then another and another until there were at leas a dozen pulling the hawk into the pit! Three had wrapped themselves around the bird's neck, preventing him from crying for help. Janaff was unaware until the rumbling was so loud that even he could hear it. He looked back, and his eyes went wide with shock at the fate befalling his friend.

"Ulki!" Janaff cried, soaring down to the mass of tendrils grabbing at his companion. He tried with all his might to pull the rope-like assailants away, to cut them off, but they were as thick as the trunks of small trees. Despite Janaff doing everything in his power to save his comrade, Ulki was dragged away into the pit and out of sight.


	9. Chapter 8

Footsteps echoed through the hall leading to the throne room. The tigers guarding the corridor nodded their heads in respect as she made her approach. She was promoted from Commander to General less than a week ago due to her outstanding performance on the field of battle during the campaign against Daein.

General Lethe. That had a nice ring to it. But now her king wished to see her. She could smile to herself about her newfound status later.

Perhaps this was her first assignment as a General. If that was the case, what could it be? Would she plan and lead a raid on a slave plantation in Begnion and free the brother laguz enslaved there? Or would her mission be to wipe out a last pocket of Daein resistance planning to launch a suicidal last resort attack on Gallia, unaware that the fall of their king meant their mission to wipe out the Beast Tribe had ended in failure?

The newly-appointed General would soon be disappointed to discover that what his Majesty wished to see her for would be far more menial.

The doors to the hall of the King of Beasts swung open and a young woman with ginger hair, soul-piercing eyes, clad in a green and yellow tunic stepped in. As revealed by her tail and ears, she was of the Beast Tribe. Her name was Lethe. King Caneghis looked down at her from his throne at the end of the room. Lethe bowed low before him. Her king was the only person she'd dare ever bow for.

"I have a question, General," the Beast King announced, "How quickly did you come here?"

"I quickly as I could, your Majesty," Lethe answered.

"That's what I've been meaning to talk to you about," Caneghis continued. "Now of course, it can only be expected of a decent servant to rush to their monarch's side as soon as possible at even the slightest notice. Your sense of duty is certainly admirable."

"Thank you, my lord."

"You are quite welcome. However, it has occurred to me that you take your occupation in the Gallian army a bit too seriously."

"...Excuse me, your Highness?"

"I am proud to have a warrior like you in my ranks. But, the fact of the matter is... Well, you're making the rest of us look bad."

Lethe was silent.

"I know that's putting it a little bluntly, but you're outperforming everyone else by a significant margin."

"But my lord, I've only been a General for a few days! Surely I'm not showing my peers up there, as well," Lethe argued.

"I know you have. And somehow, you're also outperforming everyone else as a General," the King of Beasts contradicted.

"But...But how is that even possible?"

"I'm not sure either, but it is somehow, because you're doing it. That's why I'm allowing you temporary leave from the Gallian fighting forces."

"T-temporary leave?" Lethe stuttered. "Your Majesty, you're too gracious, truly! I surely cannot accept this!"

"You can, and I suggest you will. You need to calm down and focus on something other that life as a soldier," Caneghis explained. "Again, Lethe, your work ethic is admirable, but you must realize that Daein is defeated, the war is over, and laguz slavery in Begnion is coming to an end. You need not trouble yourself over it constantly."

"But I'm only..."

"I know, you're only thinking of the safety of Gallia and its people. You have good intentions. I know that. However, you aren't the only one working to make our nation more secure. You _can _rest once in a while. That is why I'm sending you to Crimea for a week with the sole purpose of taking your mind off of your work."

"...Crimea...?"

"Yes. You know that beorc and laguz live together peacefully there, right? If it would make you more comfortable, you could have someone accompany you."

Lethe took a moment to be silent and comprehend her situation. Her king was basically ordering her to stop doing the only thing she knew how to do!

"Is Ranulf available?" Lethe asked after a few moments.

"No, he's at Crimea Harbor on account of the visitors from Elibe and Magvel," the Beast king answered.

"What about Ike? He has a deal to settle with me."

"I believe he also has to deal with the guests and his father's mercenaries."

"...Dare I ask about Mordecai?"

Caneghis threw up his hands before allowing them to fall back down onto the arms of his throne. "I've no idea where Mordecai is."

"How about Muarim?"

"Ah yes, Muarim... Same as Mordecai."

Lethe's heart sank. That left only her younger sister Lyre. Oh no, she wasn't doing that. "I suppose I'll go alone," she said after another silence.

"What about your sister?" the King of Beasts questioned. Lethe sighed and shut her eyes tightly.

"I guess I'll take Lyre," she said.

"Very well then, Lyre it is. Remember; don't trouble yourself over your new status or even your service to me or Gallia. Just relax and enjoy yourself doing whatever it is you find yourself doing. This is for your own good."

That would be much easier said than done for Lethe.


	10. Chapter 9

Lethe's tail twitched madly in annoyance as she walked down a trail through trees and marshes of the Gallian landscape. This trail was meant for the beorc, a slow and clumsy species. Normally Lethe would rather take the true laguz path through the untamed jungles, but someone insisted that she take this route.

"Hey there, little bunny!" a cheery voice exclaimed in the bushes. "I'm hungry, so I'm gonna kill and eat you now, 'kay?"

Just ignore her. She's young and foolish, Lethe told herself.

"...It's really a very technical thing that happens next, because..."

No, pay her no mind. She's just playing around, she has to be. Even _she _knows better than this.

"...And then man-piss goes all over man-body..."

"Lyre, what are you doing?!" Lethe snapped at her younger sister, who was hiding in behind a tree trunk in her cat form. "You're supposed to remain completely silent and hide in the _bushes_, not behind a tree, until you strike!"

Lyre turned her head to face her sister and shrugged. "I was only playing around," she said innocently. "But seriously, I'm hungry. How much longer until we reach Crimea?"

"We've only just left the capital."

Lyre sighed and changed to her human form. Her shoulder-length hair was the same colour as Lethe's and through she shared her sister's purple eye colour Lyre's eyes were much warmer and friendlier than Lethe's. She wore a demi-band, an item that allowed laguz to stay in animal form as long as they pleased (normally they had to return to human form to rest after being in animal form for extended periods of time) around her neck, beige wooden sandals, strips of teal cloth around her wrists, a chain mail skirt, and a midriff-bearing leather tanktop. She was a small girl, even smaller than her diminutive sister. Lyre had to run to catch up to her older sister, who was becoming impatient of her easily-distracted sibling.

Lethe crinkled her nose as she caught nose of her sister's iron skirt. "Now I see why you need the demi-band," she said matter-of-factly, "there's no way you could sniff out anything, be it prey or an enemy soldier approaching you in human form with that thing on."

Lyre looked down at her skirt, and then back up at Lethe once she had finally caught up. "I could probably find a band for you if you hate it so much," she offered.

"I'm quite fine without a band, thank you." Lethe was quick to reject the offer. She was able to assume cat form for several hours at a time; most hunts- or battles- were over before she had to revert back to her more vulnerable human state.

"Suit yourself," said Lyre, shrugging.

"So what are we doing on this beorc pathway?" Lethe asked. "We'd get to our destination quicker if we went the usual Gallian way through the jungle. It'd hurt my pride less, as well."

"There's better hunting around here," answered the young sister as if that was the most obvious thing in the world.

"More rabbits to chat up?" the older sibling asked sarcastically.

"I told you, I was only playing around! Next one we find, I'll be serious."

"Right. Also, why did you bring up the bands when I commented on your skirt?"

"Because you'd be able to keep up with me without having to rest if we both had one."

"Oh please, Lyre. You're so easily sidetracked that I'd get far ahead of you if we both had a band. And how does this road have better hunting?"

"Fine, we'll go through the marsh," said Lyre, rolling her eyes as if Lethe were the crazy one and not her. Then both changed into their cat forms, which looked identical except for a slight size difference and different items around their necks; the demi-band around Lyre's, a long, thin, green scarf with a small bell tied to the end around Lethe's. The sisters charged off into the sea of trees, leaving the beorc trail behind. They'd arrive at Crimea much sooner this way, and contrary to Lyre's strange mind, there would be better hunting as well.


	11. Chapter 10

Crimea Harbor was a rather popular area for fishers in the morning and young lovers in the night. But in mid afternoon, it was all but abandoned. Ike stood alone at the docks. Ranulf had gone off to attend to something. How convenient that he'd wait to do it until the last possible moment. Now Gallia had no representative. Kilvas, the crow nation, had decided not to trouble themselves with these visitors, as expected. There was no one for Goldoa either. It seemed the Black Dragon King didn't have a change of heart after all. Just then, Janaff flew in and landed. At least Phoenicis had its priorities straight. Ulki was nowhere to be seen, however, and Janaff looked deeply troubled, almost frightened.

Then Ike spied a ship approaching in the distance. Ranulf had better hurry, thought Ike. The Elibe flag was raised high into the air. With his highly acute vision, Janaff could make out two figures standing on the Elibe vessel's deck: Eliwood and Hector. Janaff could also see the _Stellar Wasp_, flying Magvel's flag a league or two behind. He managed to repress the memories of recent events and tried to smile.

Soon enough, both ships had pulled into the harbor. Ike patted Janaff on the shoulder startling him a bit.

"You don't look so good," said Ike. "If you'd like, you could just hang back here while I handle the introductions."

"Thanks, I'd like that," Janaff replied, sounding considerably less lively than usual.

Ike went to the Elibe ship first, as it was the first to pull in. Hector stumbled down the plank to the dock below. After several days at sea, being on solid ground would take some adjusting to. The gigantic axe he constantly kept on hand threw him off balance a bit as well. Ike found the spectacle somewhat amusing.

"Why the axe?" he asked. Eliwood, who followed closely behind Hector, took answering that question upon him.

"Hector was practically born with Wolf Beil in his hands," Eliwood joked.

"I assume you are Lord Eliwood?" Ike speculated.

"Indeed I am. General Ike?"

"I shed the status of General after the war against Daein. I'm content to simply lead the mercenary company my father left me."

"Of course. Queen Elincia told us about Ashnard and his mad ambition."

"It's too bad our two continents hadn't made contact when he was around," Hector said with borderline-foolish confidence. "That war would've only lasted a fraction as long if I was there."

"I assure you the mad king of Daein was a formidable opponent," Ike replied. "The entirety of Tellius had to join against him to finally seize victory."

Meanwhile, over at the _Stellar Wasp_, Ephraim observed the harbor. It looked almost desolate, so desolate that it seemed ridiculous to think how active it was in the early morning and in the dead of night. Erika and Seth joined him on the deck.

"How's everyone down below?" asked the prince.

"They're doing fine. Amelia seems excited," Seth answered.

"Is there any reason why we brought her?" Ephraim asked.

"Please, brother, must you always be so brash?" Erika questioned. "Sir Duessel insisted we allow her to come. She _is _an orphan, remember. Duessel has practically become her father."

"Hm. I'm almost shocked Saleh didn't insist we bring Ewan."


	12. Chapter 11

It had been a few hours since the ships from Elibe and Magvel had arrived. Eliwood, Hector, Ephraim, and Erika would join Queen Elincia at Castle Crimea. Their companions would stay at the many inns of Malthrowin, the closest settlement to Crimea Harbor. Malthrowin was know for many things; its ridiculous number of inns (at least seven or eight), its infamous flameroot vendors (flameroot was an herb that caused thunderous flatchelunce, but dealt with severe head colds quite nicely), and most of all, its pubs. One small, but busy little bar called _Wyvern's Perch_ was the first stop of Matthew and Sain.

The duo sat at the barstools, surveying the candlelit pub. Sain was quite interested in wooing a laguz woman, to the point where Matthew was certain he had some kind of odd fetish. Finally, the Elibe knight's eye fell upon two who had just walked into the _Perch_. Twins, from the look of it. Both had ginger hair and purple eyes. One had short hair and a mean-looking glare. Said made a mental note to avoid this one. The other with longer hair and a friendlier expression was the girl he'd go for.

"Matthew," he whispered to his accomplice, "I'll bet you 400 gold that I can get that little long-haired dame with the collar around her neck in the same bed as me by the stroke of midnight."

"If you insist. You'd have to get her away from her companion, though. She looks like she'd rip your head off if she even thought you'd try to bed her," the thief replied.

"Yes, I'm quite aware of that. What do you think the odds of one leaving the other alone for a while are?" asked Sain.

"Notice how their ears and tails are identical to a cat's. That obviously means they're part cat. Cats are solitary animal," Matthew explained, "except, however, when they're family. Those two look like sisters. If that's the case, they won't leave each other's side for even a moment. That will be 400 gold, please." He held his hand out expectantly.

Out of the corner of her eye, Lethe spied two beorc looking at her and Lyre. She figured they were foreigners, and therefore tried to ignore them. She would, however, remain wary of them if they looked like they might try something. Lyre had insisted that they engage in pub-going, and that was what led them to _Wyvern's Perch_. Although the _Perch_ was usually a hotspot for the locals, it was a bit empty tonight.

"We're here," Lethe said to her sister, "what now?"

"...I never thought about that," Lyre replied with wondering eyes. "What do you wanna do?"

"I'd like to leave."

"His Majesty insists that you take your mind off your General-hood! There's no better way to take your mind off something than pub-going."

As if on cue, a drunken patron attempted to stand up from his stool, but soon fell over, rambling like a madman, and passed out. It was an amusing spectacle, to say the least. Lyre was certainly amused. Lethe hardly noticed.

"See? I told you this would be fun!" Lyre exclaimed. Then she noticed that Lethe didn't really care. "You know what? You need a drink."

"Excuse me? I'm perfectly fine," Lethe said sternly. "Besides, you know how I feel about wine."

"You don't have to have wine! You could have rum, mead, plain old booze..."

"You know how I feel about alcohol in general."

"Sister! Honestly, you're too serious! Do you EVER have fun?"

Just then, Lethe got wind of a familiar scent. "Go right ahead, if your idea of fun is losing your mind, getting wooed by the wrong men, and becoming violently ill," she snorted, "I've more important matters to attend to."

Lethe peered out the window and caught a glimpse of a green blur move in between two buildings. Even though she only saw it briefly, she knew instantly who it was, and she was glad to see him. Without saying a word to Lyre, who was now buying her first of many drinks, she left the _Perch _in pursuit.

Excellent, Sain thought happily. The sister's gone. She's drinking wine. Here's my chance!

"I may yet emerge victorious!" the knight announced to his comrade. "Keep your 400 gold handy, Matthew. I'm gonna get me some tail!" With that, Sain made his move, relocating to the stool next to Lyre.

"Excuse me, but can your acute sense of hearing hear my heart beat faster as I gaze upon your radiance?" Sain drawled. Lyre wasn't drunk enough to buy it yet.

"Uh... No, not really. I'm Lyre. What's your name?"

"I am Sain, brave knight of Sacae, Elibe! I have come to your grand homeland of Tellius with my lords Eliwood and Hector!"

"...Neato. So, um, can I help you?"

"Yes you can, fair maiden!" Sain needed more time on his hands and more wine clouding Lyre's mind before he could work his magic. "But first, I'd like to help you. May I buy you another drink or two?"

"Sure, thanks... I guess. So what could I help you with?"

"I'm not sure if your fine-tuned nose had caught a whiff of my infatuation, but perhaps you could relieve this heartache of mine?"

"...No, I can't say I smell anything from you but the iron you're armour's made of. And no, I'm not too good with heartaches, sorry."

"Ah, but surely your eyes can see through the veil of darkness clouding my eyes!"

A look of confusion formed on Lyre's face. "There's no veil around your eyes. I have a question for you, now: Is everyone in Elibe as weird as you?"

"If being lovestruck makes me odd, then I am as odd a man as you will ever meet! And no, its just me, to the best of my knowledge at least."

Even though she had just finished her second goblet of wine, Lyre still was sober enough to continue rejecting Sain. "Are you sure? Because I don't think love can drive anyone as crazy as you. In fact, you're starting to frighten me a bit. Could you go away, please? I've more than enough gold to pay for my own beverages."


	13. Chapter 12

While Sain could only hope Lyre would eventually get enough alcohol in her to finally give in to his hounding, another chaser of the fairer sex was having much better luck. In a small cottage just outside of Malthrowin, Bastian awaited his damsel, sitting anxiously in a cocoon of bed sheets on a large cot. Soon, Lady Lucia, wrapped in bathrobes, joined him.

"Ah, my radiant flower of the Crimean plains!" the French/Spanish/Something-or-other poet sage exclaimed as Lucia's long, flowing, blue hair fell upon his lap. "My dearest Lucia, how have you been since the mad king Ashnard's defeat at the strong and brave General Ike's hands?"

"I've been well, although I can't seem to comprehend how I allowed you to fool me into this," Lucia replied with an awkward smile. "How have you been, Bastian?"

"My heart suffered a wound most agonizing when I saw you off after the war! But now that I see you again, smiling and in my arms, I feel as though I have never felt the cruel grip of pain in my entire lifetime!"

"...Well, I'm not really in your arms yet, I'm still working up to that..."

"Please, my fair lady, allow us this embrace! Let us become lost in an ocean of lust!"

"...If we must..."

Anyone reading this can most likely imagine what happened next. It never got to the point Bastian had hoped for, however. Lucia refused to remove her robe, but the sage was all too eager to remove his clothing.

Suddenly, a painting on the wall began to quiver a bit. Then it began to shake violently as a faint rumbling could now be heard as the entire cottage began to quake! Furniture was now falling over! The rumbling was soon as loud as thunder! Understandably, Lucia found this to be quite the mood killer. But Bastian would not be put off.

"It is but a mere tremor, my fairest lady! It shall pass!" he insisted. The floorboards began to crack and splinter.

"For the love of the goddess, Bastian, the floor is opening! Mere tremors can't break floors open!" Lucia yelped.

Then the entire wood floor to the left of the cot exploded open, and a massive pair of jaws, lined with sharp, yellow teeth and surrounded by grey, scaly skin poked out, opening a bit and letting out a horrible screech! Even Bastian knew they had a problem now. Lucia jumped out of the sheets like she had springs for legs, but Bastian was not quite as graceful. A long, fleshy tendril shot out of the maw and plunged a mosquito-like stinger into his back, and began pumping something into him!

A wave of nausea and terror swept over Lucia as she stood dumbstruck for a moment, watching her lover be mutilated. She snapped back to her senses, however, when two clawed tentacles burst from the floor and grabbed her legs! But, being small, graceful, and scared out of her wits, Lucia managed to struggle free, albeit losing her bathrobe in the process, and ran out of the cottage and into the dark forest, half-naked and screaming bloody murder.

Janaff wandered down the empty streets of night-time Malthrowin. By this hour, everyone was either in bed, at the pubs, or down at the harbor doing what lovers do. Janaff wasn't quite sure why he walked down the street in human form rather than flying away in hawk form. It just wasn't the same without Ulki, he figured. He wouldn't be alone much longer, however. Ike soon found him, and managed to catch up to him quite easily. Although Janaff was quick and swift in the air, on the ground he was slow and clumsy, as most Bird Tribe were.

"Janaff," said Ike, "where's Ulki? Why are you so depressed?"

"...Something happened on the way here. I had to see my king and Queen Elincia," Janaff explained. He tried to manage his usual smile, but simply couldn't.

"What happened, exactly?"

"Tibarn insist that I not tell anyone the details other than Elincia. Sorry, but I can't tell you." Then, he saw something up ahead, running through the forest. Fair complexion, milky white skin, flowing blue hair- there was no mistaking that it was Lucia. "Wait here a moment," Janaff told Ike. He changed to his bird form and flew over to Lucia.

She was hysterical, shaking violently, her skin even more pale than usual. There were bruises around her ankles, like something grabbed her very tightly there. Janaff landed in front of her and tried to calm her down. Upon seeing him, Lucia seemed to regain a bit of her senses, and allowed herself to fall into his arms, weeping madly and rambling about Bastian.

"Oh gods, Bastian!" she cried.

"Bastian? He's that poet guy, right?" Janaff asked. Lucia was in no condition for questions, however.

"I-it came out of the fl-floor! At first we thought it was only a small tremor, but then it burst out of the floor and killed him!" Lucia ranted and raved like a mad woman.

"Calm down, please, just for a moment! What came out of the floor? _Where_did it come out of the floor?"

Lucia regained a bit of her composure and fought back the tears.

"Me and Bastian... We were in this little cottage in the forest. We wanted a bit of time alone- Bastian's idea, of course, but I went along with it." She explained. "Then the cottage started shaking, like there was an earthquake. Suddenly, the floor boards burst open and and this... this THING came out and attacked us! It was like a... a mouth or something, it had fangs and it must have been big enough to swallow our cot whole. And then there was a tongue or something and tentacles, and..."

"Tentacles?"

"Yes, tentacles! Tentacles with claws on the ends!"

That made it obvious to Janaff that the thing that attacked him and Ulki had found its way here. Elincia was going to need to know about this.

But first, Lucia was going to need to know that she had just ran through the woods screaming at the top of her lungs, wearing nothing more than silken undergarments.


	14. Chapter 13

Castle Crimea was not far from Malthrowin, only a mile or two to the east. It was a large and grand building- as all castles should be. And yet, even with a half-dozen bathrooms, Eliwood still couldn't find even one. His search caused him to stumble upon the throne room, where he overheard an interesting conversation.

"Your majesty, the monster has found its way to the village of Malthrowin," a soldier reported to Queen Elincia.

"Already? It was first found at the Daein border this morning. How has it moved so fast?" the Queen replied.

"We don't know. But it has attacked a small cottage just outside of the village. One of your most loyal retainers was killed," the soldier continued.

"...Has it attacked the village yet?"

"No, your highness. It seems to be waiting in the forest surrounding Malthrowin."

A monster was terrorizing the countryside? Eliwood listened intently, hiding just out of sight, behind the partially-open door to the throne room.

"So it has killed three now?"

"Two or three. The hawk ambushed near the site of the first attack may have survived. But if any good came from the tonight's incident, it gave us a better idea of what the monster is. We know it's big, it digs through the earth to move about quickly and stealthily, it has dozens of long tentacles with talons on the ends, at least its head has a dull grey color, it has a tongue like a frog, and it's reptilian. The scholars are sure the beast is a serpent."

"I will have General Geoffrey send a hunting party to Malthrowin to flush the creature out and destroy it, or at least send it away from the populace," Elincia announced. This was when Eliwood made his presence known.

"Excuse me, your majesty," he said, walking in, "I realize full well that I'm being rather rude right now barging in on this, but I overheard that you may have a problem."

"Halt!" another soldier exclaimed. Before he could go on, however, Elincia intervened.

"At ease. Yes, Lord Eliwood, we may be facing a crisis. But you need not concern yourself with it," the Queen explained. "I have my most skilled General working on containing the situation.

"I have another idea, your highness. As you may know, I have in my possession a sword meant for slaying dragons, and one of my companions is a master tactician. Perhaps I could have my company engage the beast first, and if we fail, your General can move in," Eliwood purposed.

"But you came to Tellius as guests, not as the first line of defence against an unknown foe!" Elincia argued.

"If it would mean allowing your people could live safely without fear of a monstrous serpent lurking beneath the ground, I would be happy to be the first line of defence, and I'm sure my comrades would be as well."

"...I don't like the idea...Are you sure?"

"Absolutely! The only payment I require is the directions to a washroom."

While his sister slept, Ephraim could not find peace. Incidentally, neither could Seth. They met in the castle's keep, where they talked about various things. For those interested, Ephraim, Seth, and Erika were accompanied on their visit to Tellius by Duessel, an older general and former lance instructor to Ephraim, nicknamed "the Obsidian", who also was like an adoptive father to Amelia; Natasha, a graceful, yet serious cleric; Saleh, a master sage, solemn and intellectual; and finally, Amelia, a young orphan girl, honest and determined.

"Bloody cold at night here, isn't it?" said Ephraim. Seth nodded his head in agreement. With nothing much to talk about, they were currently chatting about whatever popped into their heads. They talked like this a while longer before Seth began to tire and left the castle, headed back to the inn in Malthrowin, leaving the prince alone.

Ephraim soon wandered back up to his own room, briefly stopping by the door to Erika's room. He opened the door a crack and peered in. His sister was fast asleep, almost completely covered with blankets, most of which were over her head, leaving her feet exposed. The Princess of Renais always slept like that. It was a wonder she hadn't suffocated herself in her sleep yet. Once Ephraim was convinced she was safe and sleeping, he continued on his way to his waiting bed.


	15. Chapter 14

The alleyways of Malthrowin in the ungodly early hours of the morning were empty. Except for tonight. Tonight, Lethe searched them, following the leads of her nose and ears. He was around here somewhere. She could smell him, and once she got a bit closer, she'd be able to hear him too. The only visual contact she'd made was a brief glimpse and a few footprints. But her search was soon to come to an end.

"Well, hello there," a gravely voice suddenly rasped from out of nowhere, startling Lethe a bit. She looked around. No one there. She was alone in this particular alley. She sniffed the air. The only scent was the one she was pursuing and it was still a fair distance away.

"Show yourself," Lethe demanded. For several moments, no response came. "Did you not hear me? Show yourself!"

"I heard you well. I hear everything. Yours words, your thoughts, everything," the voice hissed. It seemed to come from deep within Lethe's mind, as though someone were communicating with her telepathically. No, that couldn't be right, she thought. Surely it was just an illusion concocted by her tired mind. Lethe decided to head back to the inn she and Lyre had checked into and resume her search in the morning.

"Going to bed, are you?" the voice asked. Lethe froze dead. Indeed, that was her intention. But she hadn't said a word about it.

"How did you…" Lethe began before she was interrupted.

"I hear every word leaving your mouth and every thought clouding your mind. So you're looking for somebody, eh?"

"…Where are you? Come out where I can see you!" Lethe demanded.

"I'll reveal myself when you tell me how you're looking for," the voice hissed with malevolent glee.

"That's none of your business. Who are you? What do you want?!"

During all of this, Lethe didn't notice the talons slowly rising out of the earth beneath her, crawling out of the earth towards her ankle. She also didn't notice a shadowy figure approaching her from behind. Suddenly, two thick arms grabbed Lethe and pulled her out of the alley, away from the claws.

"Mff! Let… Go of me!" Lethe cried before she managed to struggle free. Then, she recognized the scent of her attacker. "Maurim?!" she exclaimed, turning around.

"I'm glad I found you, as well," Maurim replied. "We've been having a lot of difficulties with the Laguz Emancipation Army. Difficulties that left half of our forces dead and forced us out of our territory."

"Excuse Me?!" Lethe was understandably alarmed at this news. Maurim was second-in-command of the Laguz Emancipation Army, a group dedicated to freeing enslaved and oppressed laguz. The leader was Tormond, a beorc boy Maurim took in when he was an infant. After the fall of Daein and the Begnion slave trade, the LEA had considerably grown in size and power.

"We were attacked at our headquarters two days ago. We couldn't see our attackers. They seemed to be hidden in the sand," Maurim explained. "We know not what attacked us, but we do know that whatever it was, by the time it was done with us half our the army was dead or badly injured. We decided to move our base of operations to Crimea. We knew we'd be accepted with open arms here." During this conversation, the talons slid back into the ground and disappeared.

"…Did you see anyone here besides me?" Lethe changed the subject. Surely someone had been toying with her. A mind-reader? The idea was preposterous!

"No, only you," Maurim answered.

"…I'm staying at an inn nearby with my sister. I'm sure the innkeeper wouldn't mind if you joined us," Lethe offered.

"You never told me you had a sister."

"No, I haven't, had I? Yes, I have a younger sister. He name is Lyre, but once you meet her, I think you'll discover why I've never mentioned her."

"Well, now I'm interested in meeting her! Tormond wasn't expecting me to arrive at our new headquarters for another day anyway. Sure, I'll join you."

"Very well. But I warn you, Lyre is a bit… excitable. Expect to be on the ground at least once."


	16. Chapter 15

Even though Elincia agreed to allow Eliwood and his company to engage the threat first, she still ordered that Malthrowin be evacuated, and that Geoffrey move several units of paladins and snipers into the village. If the enemy was waiting just outside of the town, it was likely to attack soon; and when it did, it would have a small army waiting for it.

Lethe awoke to dozens of horses' hooves pounding down the street outside of the inn. Her room was in disarray, thanks to Lyre's enthusiasm to meet Maurim the previous night. As expected, she had tackled him to the ground and began ranting and raving about how excited she was to finally meet him, and how much Lethe talked about him.

In truth, Lethe had only mentioned Maurim to her sister once or twice. The room had two beds; one that Lethe slept in alone, the other Lyre had Maurim pinned to.

There was a knock on the door. Lethe pulled her tunic on and opened it. A Crimean soldier was on the other side of the door, lance and shield in hand.

"Her Majesty, Queen Elincia, has ordered that this village be evacuated of all civilians. For your safety, you're going to have to leave immediately," the soldier announced.

"Why is that?" Lethe questioned in reply.

"I can't tell you," the soldier answered.

"Under what circumstances might you be able to tell me?" Lethe asked.

"If you were someone of importance or high standing. But from where I'm standing, lady, you look like a peasant," the soldier said bluntly.

"Then what if I told you I was General Lethe of Gallia, sent here by King Gallia himself?"

"Then I'd tell you what's going on and leave you be. But like I said, you look like a peasant to me." Lethe then showed him the mark on the back of her left ear; the mark of a Gallian general. The soldier lifted his helmet to examine it. "My apologises, ma'am!" he exclaimed after a moment. "What about those two back there, then?" He pointed his lance at Maurim and Lyre. They were both still asleep.

"Don't worry about them, they'll be leaving soon," Lethe explained. "So what's going on here?"

"How should I know? I'm just a foot soldier," the soldier replied with a shrug. "General Geoffrey is here, though. He should be able to give you some answers."

Eliwood and Hector led Marcus, Sain, and Oswin through the forest surrounding Malthrowin. So far, they had encountered nothing. Matthew had stayed behind to "help with the evacuation", as he put it, and Mark had simply given them some advice on underground-dwelling creatures, such as staying off soft ground and moving slowly and quietly. Eliwood wielded the blade Durandal, infused with dragon-slaying magic, and Hector had his axe Wolf Beil on hand. Marcus and Sain rode their white and brown steeds while Oswin stayed at the back of the group. His armour, covered in the scars of previous battles, was nearly impenetrable. They truly were a force to be reckoned with.

Following Mark's advice, the Elibe brigade stayed off the dirt path, as the soil was soft there and something under the ground could easily burst out from beneath it. After an hour of moving slowly and cautiously uphill through thick foliage, they came to Lucia and Bastian's cottage. It was now a hulking pile of rubble, with something carved into a chunk of wood that used to be a door: _Blowout_. The message looked to have been carved into the wood with a sharp implement, such as a sword, dagger… or perhaps, even a claw. Eliwood and Hector examined the carving while their comrades waited by the tree line.

"What do you suppose it means?" Eliwood wondered.

"Perhaps it's a warning," Hector speculated.

"Could be. But a warning about _what_?"

"Well, it says 'blowout', so it obviously has something to do with something blowing out."

"Yes, but what, I wonder…."

Then, there was a faint rumbling. A rumbling that quickly grew louder. Everyone snapped to attention, weapons at the ready. Suddenly, four fleshy, worm-like proboscises, coloured orange, covered in plates of turtle shell-like armour and pulsing veins, ending in beaks shot out of the grass and bit into Marcus and his steed! They could scarcely even scream, however, before the beasts sucked them dry like vampires and retreated back into the earth! The victims dropped to the ground as stiff, pale corpses! Another proboscis, the same one that attacked Bastian, shot out of the soil and into Oswin's chest, punching clear through his armour!

Sain shrieked and cowered like a small child, falling off his spooked horse, when galloped away into the forest after freed of its rider as Hector rushed to Oswin's aid, already too late as the stinger slithered back into the hole it sprang from and as a clawed tentacle briefly popped out of the ground, just long enough to carve something into Owsin's armour. During all of this, Eliwood ran to Marcus' side, hoping that his guardian may still be alive- only to be met with sorrow and disappointment when it only took one glance to confirm that Marcus, Paladin of Pharae, was dead. Oswin, however, was still clinging to life.

"Oswin!" Hector cried, as Oswin wheezed and writhed. "Hold on, Oswin! There has to be someone with a heal staff or an elixir near here! Just hold on a while longer!"

"Inside…" Oswin gasped, "There's… Ahhhh! There's something inside of me!"

"What?! Inside of you?!" Hector exclaimed more than asked. This got Eliwood's attention.

"In my chest! Agony, oh gods, the agony! Kill me!" Oswin screamed and squirmed!

"Wha-Kill you?!" Then Hector noticed what was carved into Oswin's shoulder plate: _Grave Digger_. Blood began to bubble out of the knight's mouth. Hector and Eliwood watched in horror (Sain was currently in the fetal position a few meters away) as more blood began to spurt from Oswin's wound. Then, something crawled out of the wound!

A hissing creature like a huge orange centipede with no legs, fanged, segmented jaws, long antennae, and narrow insect eyes stared back at the repulsed lords before jumping out of Oswin's chest and skittering away into the bushes! Oswin gave one last pained gasp before finally dying. Eliwood and Hector stared at the wound, then the fleeing creature that emerged from it, and then at each other.

The rumbling could be heard again, and now, it was heading in the direction of Malthrowin.


	17. Chapter 16

Snipers prowled the rooftops and paladins, mounted on white steeds and wielding long steel lances, thundered down the streets. Heavily-armoured knights surrounded Malthrowin, letting only evacuating citizens out and absolutely nothing in. Wyvern riders prowled the skies over the village and the forests. Lethe led Lyre and Maurim out of the town. Lyre would go with Maurim to the improvised LEA headquarters near the Crimean capital, while Lethe stayed behind. If Gallian troops were involved they'd have a surprise guest waiting to direct them.

Geoffrey was easy enough to find. Lethe recognized his scent after fighting Daein forces alongside him during the previous war. Obviously, he wasn't expecting to see her.

"You look familiar," said Geoffrey upon seeing Lethe, "yes, you were with us in the campaign against Ashnard. What was your name again?"

"General Lethe. I understand you are General Geoffrey?"

"Indeed I am. What are you doing here?"

"To ask you what's going on. Why do you have an army quarantining an obscure village like this?"

"…I'm not quite sure how to put it, but… It seems Daein may not be done with us. Yesterday morning a laguz girl was killed at the Crimea-Daein border. She was sucked dry, like how a spider feeds on a fly. Since then, there have been similar attacks. The most recent was late last night, just outside of this village."

"And you think Daein may have something to do with it?"

"Think about it, Lethe. The first victim was found at Daein's border. The first two victims were laguz. It seems reasonable to suspect Daein."

Lethe thought about what Maurim told her about the attack on the LEA in Begnion. Then, there was a faint rumble in the distance. Then came a horrible stench, like rotten corpses. Then, one of the knights barricading the town came waddling down the road towards Geoffrey, his armour covered in deep gashes and fresh blood. The knight rambled like a madman before coming to a halt and falling over dead.

The rumbling grew louder, and louder, and louder, until it abruptly stopped. No one moved, no one said a word. All the soldiers had their weapons at the ready. Suddenly, the ground exploded beneath a section of the market place, causing a half dozen food stands to shot up into the air and come crashing down into a large sinkhole! An inn collapsed as the rumbling returned, loud as thunder! It was then that the culprit finally revealed itself.

The entire marketplace sunk into the quaking ground. Terrified horses threw off their riders and fled as several snipers stumbled and fell off of the rooftops they were stationed on! Then, something arose from the earth. Something big. A mane of clawed, writhing tentacles surrounded a grey head, crowned by a frill of spikes and horns! A gigantic serpent, about ninety feet long and as thick as a tree trunk, with a dark blue coloration (save for its dull grey head) decorated with black stripes and red splotches arranged in a pattern down the serpent's sides, pulled itself out of the earth! Its huge red eyes surveyed the chaos it had caused before it opened its mouth, lined with long, curved, yellow fangs and allowed its deafening roar to fill the air! The stench of this abomination was nearly enough to make Lethe violently ill, but the beorc didn't seem to notice the oder; they were more concentrated on its appearance. Their weak sense of smell probably wouldn't detect the awful scent anyway.

Geoffrey struggled to his feet; his steed had bucked him off as well. He gave the order for the snipers to open fire. They fired every shot with pin-point accuracy, but their arrows merely glanced off of the serpent's hide. It launched its counterattack by shooting out four proboscis, the same that sucked Marcus and his horse dry, from its mouth and draining the snipers, leaving them too as stiff, pale corpses. The consumed blood filled a translucent pouch on the serpent's throat. The paladins who were thrown off of their steeds threw away their lances and drew their bows; it was standard issue for Crimean soldiers to be skilled in archery. Geoffrey too was an excellent bowman, but not even this ceaseless barrage even seemed to bother the serpent, let lone harm it in any way.

"You came from Gallia, right?!" Geoffrey shouted to Lethe.

"Yes, I was sent by King Caneghis himself," Lethe replied.

"Get to your king, tell him we have a problem and that Crimea is in dire need of Gallia's assistance," Geoffrey ordered. "Go now!"

Lethe did not hesitate to leave. The serpent was now tearing soldiers apart with its tentacles in addition to draining them. At this rate the whole regiment would be dead in moments.

Geoffrey knew there was nothing that could be done to stop this menace here. As he fired arrow after futile arrow, he prayed to the goddess Ashera silently. He prayed that Elincia would not be harmed by this monstrosity, that Caneghis would send help, and most of all, he prayed that there was something that could destroy this leviathan before it left the country in ruin.

All he could do was pray.


	18. Chapter 17

"So it was as the scholars feared…" Elincia said grimly. "A giant serpent is running rampant. Send word to Gallia and Begnion, and muster our most powerful sages. If arrows can't harm this beast, then we'll try claws, lances, and magic. But before you go, whatever happened to Eliwood and his company?"

"Two of them were killed by the monster on its way to Malthrowin, the tactician was killed during the attack on the village," Geoffrey answered. He had barely been able to escape the serpent's attack alive, but somehow he pulled through. "Lord Eliwood and Lord Hector are unharmed and on their way back to the castle with what remains of their accompaniment."

"I have an idea, Geoffrey," Elincia announced suddenly just as the general turned away to carry out his orders. "Perhaps Ike could be able to assist us."

"I'm sure he could. Should I try to recruit him?"

"Yes. And tell him I'm sending help. Find Saleh and Duessel. Consult Prince Ephraim. I have an idea. We shall put together a task force to deal with this menace. Magvel was recently overrun with demonic hordes, and would have been annihilated if it weren't for the efforts of Ephraim and Erika. They wield demon-slaying weapons, and Eliwood has a sword forged to fell dragons. If this monster is a demon or a dragon, we know how to kill it already. Send Ephraim, Saleh, Duessel, and Eliwood to Ike's headquarters, and get everyone else back to their homelands. Garrison civilians in heavily-guarded forts. I don't want any more being killed." Elincia spoke like a queen far more experienced in warfare than she actually was. Geoffrey didn't hesitate with carrying out her commands.

"I'm afraid we can't help you." Ephraim barely thought it over before denying Geoffrey his help. "Having met Ike, I can say I think him to be a good man, and if he is the saviour of Tellius then he is clearly a great warrior as well. It would be a pleasure to fight alongside him. But my sister and I are done slaying demons. She didn't even bring her demon-killing sword."

"But you _did _bring the lance? One of those weapons would be all we need," Geoffrey argued. "If you won't Ephraim, then surely you will, Saleh?"

The rolling plains surrounding Castle Crimea were completely empty, looking like well-fertilized desolation, save for Ephraim, Geoffrey, and a middle-aged sage donning a green cape, with short, curly hair. This was Saleh, one of the most powerful magic users in Magvel.

"I would be glad to offer my assistance," Saleh replied. "You say the beast may be susceptible to magic? Then all shall do all in my power to prove this theory correct."

"Very well," Ephraim huffed. "If you wish to stay and offer your assistance, Saleh, I won't stop you. But I'm taking the others back to Magvel."

"I'm sure the others would be able to help as well," Saleh begged to differ, "Natasha could heal the weary and injured in the fortresses. Duessel could assist in tracking the monster down. Amelia could…. Well, I'm sure Amelia could do _something_."

Just then, Erika approached under the cover of the debate and latched onto Ephraim, startling him a bit.

"I won't see these people suffer because of your reluctance, brother," she pleaded. "You must help them! The tactician from Elibe was killed, but you are an excellent strategist as well! You brought Seigmund with you, so if the creature is in fact a demon then you could slay it single-handedly!"

"I'm thinking of both my safety and yours, sister," Ephraim argued. "For quite sometime after we defeated the Demon King back in Magvel, you starting twitching horribly whenever someone even said the word 'demon' in your presence. Now you want to fight another one?"

"Not exactly. I want to stay and support you while _you _fight another one," Erika corrected her brother.

"…Fine. You win," Ephraim said lamely. Erika let go of him and allowed herself a triumphant smile. "Where is Ike's base of operations?"

Sain eyed the ground nervously. Eliwood and Hector rode their steeds side-by-side in awkward silence. They were intercepted on their way back to Castle Crimea by Crimean forces and re-directed to the base of the Greil Mercenaries, where they would rendezvous with Ike and his mercenary band, as well as Ephraim and his troupe, and pool their knowledge of the monster to form a plan of attack. Right now the three rode of horseback down a shortcut to Ike's HQ along the Crimea-Gallia border. They still had no idea where Matthew was. Knowing him, it was doubtful that he was helping with the evacuation. Currently, the trio was hopelessly lost.

Suddenly, a huge orange cat ran out on the road in front of them and collapsed against a tree. Sain recognized the scarf around its neck, and upon realizing who it was, he was more spooked than all three startled horses combined. For a moment he rambled incoherently about "the scary cat lady" with bugged out eyes, which was met with strange looks from Eliwood and Hector as they calmed their horses. Then the cat reverted to its human form, revealing itself to be Lethe.

"Oh, thank heavens, its only one of those… those… ah, blast, I can never remember what they're called," Hector sighed. "One of those animal folk."

"They're called laguz," Eliwood reminded him. "You should write that down somewhere." He dismounted his horse and slowly approached Lethe's seemingly sleeping form.

Lethe heard footsteps, and smelled humans; three of them, with horses. Oh, how Lethe hated horses. They constantly reeked of unclean barn houses, and they were a testament of how lazy, weak, and slow beorc were. She opened her eyes and saw a young male beorc with fiery red hair looking back at her. Looking at his companions, she saw the one of the pub-goers eyeing her and Lyre back in Malthrowin the previous night. He didn't look happy to see her, and Lethe would be lying if she said she was happy to see him.

"You…" Lethe said weakly. She had been running non-stop for hours, and she had skipped breakfast to meet with Geoffrey. "Who are you?"

"I'm Eliwood, one of the visitors from Elibe," the beorc answered. "Behind me are Hector and Sain. Hector is the big one with the axe seemingly growing out of his palm, and Sain… Oh, dear… Sain looks like he may have wet himself."

"You smell like the monster," said Lethe. "Did you see it?"

"We didn't exactly see it, but yes, we did encounter it," Eliwood replied. "We're going to the headquarters of the Greil Mercenaries, but we seem to be a bit lost. Could you help us, by any chance?"

These three were going to Ike? This sounded promising. Lethe had many things she wanted to say to Ike. "Sure, I can help you," Lethe said in a less hostile tone (she always spoke in a hostile tone unless given good reason not to). "Just follow me. This will take a while, though. I've been running ceaselessly the whole morning. The only payment I'll require to take you to the mercenaries is something to eat and maybe some water."


	19. Chapter 18

There's one thing I'd like to say:

1- If you take the time to read this, please submit a review

I like reviews. Preferably long ones. I need to knowhow to improve this. Too short? I can deal with that.Boring? Plot droning on without going anywhere? Just give me the word and I can fix that.

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The headquarters of the Greil Mercenaries was a small settlement, three smaller buildings- an infirmary, armoury, and mess hall- built around a central fortress atop a hill, surrounded by a rock wall with two passages and a few hedges. Right now, most of the force was on duty in a coastal village fighting off marauding pirates. Ike was told that the Magvel and Elibe forces would be rendezvousing with him at the HQ, and thus decided to stay behind. Second-in-command of the mercenaries, a paladin named Titania, would command the forces in the pirate-ridden village, while Ike and the tactician/ scholar/ manager/ etc of the Greil Mercenaries, a mage by the name of Soren, stayed at the base.

Waiting the main hall, Ike peered out the half-open doorway. Mere moments ago he was pacing around the main building's courtyard. It would be dark soon, and who knew what this monster serpent became capable of when the sun went down? Soren, becoming camouflaged against the shadowed hall interior with his dark robes, long black hair, and pale skin, was growing just a bit impatient. With most of the company gone, he had fewer records to keep track of- and less to keep him occupied.

Ike and Soren, although being the only Greil Mercenaries at the HQ, were not alone. Joining them was Zihark, a master of swordsmanship and avid laguz rights activist, clad in the trademark purple robes of the Swordmasters. Also joining was Haar, a Daein wyvern rider who was convinced to join Ike's cause in the war against Ashnard. One of his eyes was covered with an eyepatch, he encased himself with dark grey armor, and had messy brown hair atop his head. The black wyvern tied to a tree in the fortress's courtyard was Haar's. Currently, Haar was asleep on a bench, as he was always tired for whatever reason. These two were invited by Ike for a few rounds of Black Jack later that night. Now they were helping with a monster hunt.

Finally, six horses appeared from the trees. The first three in the line were rode by Ephraim, Erika, and Saleh. The fourth was rode by a grey-haired man with a beard clad in maroon armor, with not only a sword, but a lance and an axe as well fastened to his horse's back; Duessel. Behind him was a cleric in flowing white robes with long, curly blond hair; Natasha. Finally was a young girl with hair the same color as Natasha's only short and straight, clad in what looked like a combination of a Japanese schoolgirl's outfit and orange medieval warrior garb; Amelia.

"Look who finally decided to come," Ike said silently as they approached. Soren came up beside him. He was about to speak, but then something caught his eye, and he simply nodded in agreement instead. Ike was sure the mage fell silent when he saw Natasha. In the slowly growing darkness of the evening she especially stood out with her golden locks and snow white garb. With this in mind, Ike suppressed chuckles and went out to greet them.

"Sorry we couldn't be here sooner," Erika apologized once the horses came to a stop and their riders dismounted.

"No need to be sorry," Ike replied, "I'm just glad you got here before tomorrow's morning light! Eliwood and his group have yet to arrive."

"Your company has quite the reputation around these parts, it seems," said Ephraim. "May we have the pleasure of meeting them?"

"They're away on duty," Ike responded. "Instead, however, I have a few of my friends to join our hunt tomorrow. See that black wyvern asleep by that tree? That's the steed of Captain Haar. That pale lad with the black hair hiding in the doorway is my tactician and company manager Soren. Our resident sword master Zihark is inside. Now may I have the pleasure of meeting _your_ force?"

Duessel was the first to step forward. "Imperial General Duessel of Grado," he introduced himself, shaking Ike's hand. "Or you could call me The Obsidian. Or, if you prefer, simply Duessel. The little one is Amelia."

Amelia was constantly at Duessel's side. "Hi..." she said shyly. Ike looked at her with a hint of concern.

"Aren't you a bit young to be joining this mission?" He asked. "Our quarry is a monster of unknown size and power."

"Amelia has proven herself in the field of battle. She can defend herself if necessary," Duessel argued. "That, and she follows me about like a lost puppy."

"I see. So you, cleric. You must be Natasha," Ike assumed.

"I am. If your company is away, you mustn't have any healers around, have you?" Natasha speculated.

"No, we don't. Your assistance will be much appreciated in that regard. I'll show you to your quarters and your horses to the stables." Ike stopped suddenly. "Wasn't there a paladin with you? Seth, his name was?" he asked.

"Seth is helping the secure Castle Crimea out of his concern for the Queen," Erika explained. "He's been defending my brother and I for so long he nows becomes protective of any royals he happens upon!"

All the while, Ike remained wary of Soren watching from the doorway. A fellow magic user of the fairer sex, a beautiful one at that, could be good for the cold and anti-social mage, if he could ever rouse himself to speak with her. Ike would have to do something to make that happen.


	20. Chapter 19

You know what this fic needs? To be longer.

In other news, I just ordered Radiant Dawn from Amazon.ca, because god knows it'll never come to Wal-Mart where I am.

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For their voyage to Ike's headquarters, Eliwood, Hector, and Sain brought only a few rations of food; they hadn't expected it to take this long to reach their destination, and they hadn't expected someone else to join them. This bothered Lethe quite a bit.

"You only brought a few strips of dried meat," she lamented upon investigating the food satchel. "That seems like poor planning to me."

"Actually, we had more at one time, but Hector ate most of it," Eliwood explained.

Just then, a horrible scent wafted to Lethe's nose. She had smelled it before, and her heart sank as she realized what it was.

"Never mind, I'm not that hungry. We're going to want to hurry up now," she insisted. She went into her animal form and picked up the pace, urging the beorc to follow her lead. Now rushing through the dark forest, they all came to a dead halt a few moments later. Ike's HQ was in sight, and yet something stopped them from getting any closer; there was a huge trench dug in their path! A massive pitfall split the earth in two and kept the quartet from their destination.

Hector, nerves a bit frayed from the day's long journey, was understandably upset. "WHERE THE HELL DID THIS COME FROM?!?" he shouted. He dismounted his steed and kicked a rock into the chasm. A few moments later, the rock flew back out of the bottomless blackness and landed at his feet. Then, another rock shot out of the pit and hit the enraged lord in the face.

"DAMN CHASMS, THROWING ROCKS AT ME!" Hector screamed, his voice going uncharacteristically high. In his rage, he was the only one who didn't notice how strange it was that a bottomless pit was chucking stones at him.

"Ah, Lord Eliwood," a deep voice suddenly rasped in the Pheraen noble's mind. "How nice that you could join us."

"What?! Who said that?" Eliwood questioned, looking all around and drawing Durandal. To the others, it looked like he was talking to himself. "Join who for what?!"

"Um... Lord Eliwood?" Sain tried to get his attention. "You seem to be... You're talking to yourself, my lord."

"Hm? Going a bit mad, are we?" the voice taunted.

"I'm not talking to myself, Sain! Can't you hear that voice?!" Eliwood exclaimed more than asked. He turned to Lethe. "You have better hearing that the rest of us, right? Can't you hear the voice?"

"No, sorry, I hear no voices other than ours'," Lethe answered.

"Hello, Sain. Come to revive old habits with half-breeds, of all things?" the voice now filled Sain's mind.

"What the?! Yes, my lord! I hear the voice! It's calling me an interspecies pervert!" Sain cried. "I-I'm not delving into old habits! After seeing a giant centipede burst out of my friend's chest, all I want is to go back to Elibe!"

During all of this, Hector was screaming bloody murder, kicking twigs, small rocks, and other such debris into the chasm, only to have it thrown back out at him. Now the voice moved on to Lethe.

"Hello, half-breed. How are things in Crimea now that Elincia has allowed her family trademark beast-man fetish to shine?" it hissed gleefully.

_Half-breed?! How dare you!_ Lethe thought this in her head rather than say it. Remembering the events in Malthrowin she knew that whoever's voice this was, they could read her thoughts, and therefore, that eliminated the need to make herself look foolish.

"Pah! Cowardly beast. Say it so these knaves can hear you!" the voice snarled. "Grave Digger, is Rangefinder ready?"

"He is, father," replied a voice as deep as an ocean abyss. Lethe knew what this meant. They were soon to come under attack.

"We need to move. NOW." Lethe ordered. "And get away from the chasm!"

"Grave Digger, Blowout, Rangefinder... Eliminate these vermin," the voice commanded. This order was heard in the minds of all four travellers. "Then move into Gallia and do as you please."

"Eliwood, pull yourself together! Hector, calm the hell down and get back on your horse!" Lethe took charge of the situation. "Sain... Actually Sain, you're doing well right now. Now let's find a way around this pit quickly!"

Too late. The centipede-like beast that spawned from the dying Oswin reared out of the chasm. Only now, it was as long as fifteen horses standing nose-to-rear in a row! This was the Grave Digger the voice spoke of. Another serpent, this one considerably smaller than Grave Digger but still quite large, with muddy brown skin, patches of blonde fur on its pointed chin, and a pale green stripe running down its back. Its head was adorned with a small mane of horns; Blowout. The two monstrosities eyed their prey hungrily, Blowout hissing and Grave Digger salivating profusely. Lethe didn't give the Elibiens time to take in the sights; she led them north-east through the thick forest. Blowout pursued, but Grave Digger had a bit of trouble hauling himself out of the chasm, so he opted to give chase from under the ground.

The moon was high in the sky now, and yet Haar still slept at the bench in the main hall. He awoke with a start when a menacing voice that seemed to come out of nowhere shouted at him.

"Get up and ready your weapon, Captain!" The voice ordered. "Mount your wyvern! The enemy is approaching!"

Haar yawned in response. "Five more minutes," he said tiredly.

"How did you ever earn the right to command troops in Daein's army, you lazy sod?" the voice growled.

"I'm not quite sure, but somehow I pulled it off." Haar opened his eyes and looked around. No one there. He must have been dreaming. He shrugged and fell back into his slumber. Then, the ground began to shake a little and a faint rumbling could be heard in the distance. Zihark, Ike, and Soren rushed into the main hall, Ike and Zihark with their blades in hand and Soren toting a scroll of wind magic. Haar opened his one functional, uncovered eye. "How'd you get here so fast?" he asked.

"Not a clue. What's going on up here?" Ike asked.

"How should I know? I was sleeping when I had this odd dream where..." Haar began before he was interrupted by the tremors growing more violent and the rumbling growing louder. Then, barely audible, but still faintly managing to reach their ears, came a cry.

"We're under attack!" exclaimed someone in the distance. Ike looked outside. Lethe was running full speed towards the HQ, with Eliwood, Hector, and Sain following close behind on horseback. Suddenly, something blew a tree out of the ground at them, missing by only a few feet! Blowout emerged from the woods in hot pursuit! Grave Digger burst from the ground, mandibles open! Ike couldn't believe his eyes.

"Since when have there been two?!" he said below his breath. Blowout stopped as Grave Digger flopped down on the earth, having just narrowly missed tearing off the upper part of Eliwood's body. Then, the former inhaled deeply, causing his brown and green body to puff up like a balloon. Lethe saw this, and even though she had no clue what Blowout was doing, a giant snake puffing up like a balloon after inhaling deeply could never be a good thing.

"Dismount your steeds and get down on the ground!" she ordered. Eliwood, Hector, and Sain did not hesitate to do as she said, jump awkwardly off of their horses, and landing with a thud. Then Blowout blew the inhaled air out with massive force, sending the horses flying into the fortress walls! Lethe and the Elibiens held onto the grass for dear life and Grave Digger began to pull himself out of the ground.

Saleh rushed out of his quarters to Ike's side, having heard the commotion. Duessel and Ephraim followed close behind. The sage's eyes went wide when he saw the attackers.

"Surely this cannot be," Saleh said with alarm. "Basilisks! Ike, you don't know what you're up against!"

Soren had heard of basilisks before, but he had only heard them and their abilities referenced. He had never heard a description or seen a depiction, but he had an idea of what they were capable of. "He's right, Ike. We have a problem," the mage said with all seriousness. "We have a very, very serious problem."


	21. Chapter 20

In order to make up for lost time (make these later chapters longer to make up for the earlier chapters being too short), I've decided to get a muse. That muse is none other than Lethe!

Lethe remains silent, standing off to the side and watching me write this. Finally, she speaks. "If it weren't for you having FireFox automatically correcting every error you make in your writing, I swear this tripe would be illegible," she comments.

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Recoiling from his attack, Blowout retreated a bit, slithering backwards, while Grave Digger awkwardly flopped towards Lethe and the Elibiens, who had nearly reached the doors to the main fort. They got inside before the pursuing beast even got close to them. Ike slammed the door shut and turned to Saleh as Haar finally awoke fully and looked around confusedly.

"Tell me everything you know about basilisks," he ordered. "Quickly, before we're eaten alive!"

"Basilisks are a hybrid between demon and dragon. They can only be slain by demon or dragon-slaying weapons and extremely powerful magic," Saleh explained quickly while Ike locked the door.

Eliwood drew Durandal and Ephraim held up his lance Seigmund. "We have the necessary equipment, then," Eliwood quipped as though slaying a duo of giant demon snakes would be an easy and entertaining task.

"But even if you do have what it takes to fell them, they still have a variety of trickery and abilities at their disposal," Saleh added quickly. "At first there is a father or mother basilisk, created by the demon god Fomortiis from an evil soul filled with vengeance and hatred that passes into the underworld."

"Wait just a bloody minute!" Ephraim exclaimed. "You mean to say that the demon king that _I killed one year ago _is throwing demonic dragons at us from his unholy ethereal kingdom?!"

"Not exactly. He needs something to work with. Once the evil soul is reincarnated into a parent basilisk by Fomortiis, the basilisk can then infect victims with its demon seeds to create more basilisks, whose powers and appearance are fashioned more those they spawned from." Saleh explained this calmly and coolly, even while Grave Digger was now trying to ram the fort's front door down with his snout. Hector and Ike held the entrance in place while Blowout peered in through a window.

"You and I have the magic, Saleh," said Soren. "Eliwood and Ephraim have the weapons. Fighting off these two would seem to be a simple matter. Is there anything else that could complicate things that we should know?"

"Yes; the parent basilisk can speak to its prey through their minds. You may hear a deep, menacing voice in your head if it is near and talking to you," Saleh replied. "Ignore the voice; don't respond to it or it will be able to find your exact location. The last thing you want is a parent basilisk knowing your exact location. Another thing: Basilisks survive on a steady diet of fresh blood. They suck it out of victims with their tongues. This is why you should stay behind a basilisk at all times unless it has a weapon or something growing out of its tail."

"Then let us begin our counterattack," Soren said solemnly before conjuring up and launching a swirling green orb or Elwind magic out of a window into Blowout's face. The serpent hissed and flinched as the magic struck him right between the eyes. Meanwhile, Grave Digger was making good progress breaking down the door. Ephraim readied Seigmund and gave Ike and Hector a moment move out of the way before he swung the door open and drove the lance deep into Grave Digger's snout. The demon screeched in pain and quickly slithered backwards away, tearing the lance out of Ephraim's hands, leaving the prince of Renais unarmed. He retreated back into the main hall, allowing Eliwood to take a swing at Blowout's side.

Blowout had better reflexes than Grave Digger, however, and slunk away from Durandal, slithering over the courtyard's wall and out of sight. For a moment, both basilisks disappeared, their growling being the only thing giving them away. This gave the defenders a moment to regroup. They spread themselves around the room. Lethe approached Saleh as Eliwood closed and locked the door.

"Saleh, right? I am Lethe," she introduced herself. "I... Hm, I'm going to feel a bit strange saying this, given the details, but he... the parent basilisk, that is... he spoke to me twice. Once in Malthrowin and once on the way here."

"It's a male, hm? Did you recognize the voice?" Saleh asked.

"No. I've heard a few voices that have sounded a bit like his, but this voice was distorted and odd," Lethe explained. "Not natural. He taunted and insulted me. Sain and Eliwood seem to have heard him, as well."

Break time was over. Grave Digger suddenly burst through the eastern wall of the main hall, sending the benches and tables lining the wall flying in all directions, miraculously not hitting anyone as they ducked for cover. The demon still had Seigmund sticking out of his snout. Soren and Saleh took turns using various kinds of offensive magic on him occasionally denting Grave Digger's exoskeleton, but for the most part not doing much.

"This is certainly a bit problematic," Soren shouted over the roaring of the attacking monster and whizzing of magic flying all about. "It seems these creatures aren't a susceptible to magic as we hoped!"

"Or we could just be using relatively weak magic," Saleh suggested. Soren thought for a moment, and then shrugged in agreement. The cold of the wind magic being thrown into his face caused Grave Digger to sneeze, sending Seigmund flying out of his nose and flying into the wall opposite to the one he smashed through narrowly missing Ike and Eliwood. As Ephraim retrieved his weapon, Saleh stepped things up a bit and cast Bolganone, an extremely powerful form of fire magic that caused a small volcano to erupt beneath the target.

The result of this manoeuvre was several benches and a small section of the floor melted by lava, and Grave Digger bursting into flames! The monster shrieked as the segments of his exoskeleton began spinning like drill bits, and the demon leapt backwards and dove into the ground. But this would buy the group no time to catch their breath, though.

Suddenly, a flurry of arrows poured in through the windows! The aim of these projectiles was not true, however. Lethe had heard them coming ahead of time and warned everyone to get down. The arrows whizzed harmlessly over their heads and embedded themselves in the northern wall. After the volley had passed, Ike cautiously peered out of one of the windows.

A smaller basilisk with bright green skin occasionally interrupted by dark red stripes and a crossbow built into its, with two translucent fleshy sacks on its sides, one filled with arrows and the other filled with what looked like wine, stared back at Ike, draining a bit of the wine from the sack with its pulsating, beaked tongue and readied another barrage. This was Rangefinder, the third child basilisk the father ordered to attack. Ike ducked back down as another storm of arrows flew in. Fortunately, everyone was still taking cover.

"I'm going back to the quarters to make sure none of these things are causing problems for Erika," Ike announced. "Anyone wanna join me?"

Zihark, Haar, and Sain raised their hands in unison and crawled over to Ike. Ike peered out the window. The basilisks seemed to be gone. They took the opportunity to run down to the long hallway lined with doors leading into individual rooms. There was, however, no need to search each room. Erika came out of her quarters to meet them.

"What's going on?" she asked, alarmed.

"We've no need to hunt for the monster tomorrow," Ephraim told her. "The monster has decided to hunt for us, and it's brought friends."

"Wh-what?!"

"Ask Saleh. Are Natasha and Amelia alright?"

"Yes, I just checked on them, they're fine... What now?"

"It would help if I had a weapon and could get to my wyvern," said Haar. Ike directed him to the armoury.

"Perhaps we should send out a distress signal," Zihark suggested.

"Excellent idea!" Ike agreed. But we lack archers, so we'd need either Soren or Saleh to do that."

Then, as if on cue, Soren came into the hallway.

"Soren! How wonderfully convenient!" Zihark exclaimed. "We need your help with something."

"I doubt I'd have time for it," Soren replied. "Saleh just sent me to send out a distress signal."

"...And now it's so convenient it's almost eerie!" Zihark retorted. "We were just about to consult you for a distress signal!"

"Then I'll need an escort to the roof. Things aren't going to well up there. Duessel is badly wounded and the hall is getting torn apart."

"I-I'll go," Sain volunteered.

Ike raised an eyebrow. "Sain, you look like you could drop dead fro9m fear at any moment," he said. "Maybe you should sit this out."

"No, as an honorable knight of Sacae, I took a vow to maintain order and justice where ever I may be," Sain defended. "I don't plan to break those vows, where ever I may be."

Soren clapped sarcastically. "So are you going to help me or will you just talk about your vows?" he asked.

"Come! Let us signal that there are satanic dragons trying to drink our bodily fluids!" Sain drew his sword and grabbed Soren's hand before stopping. "How do we get on the roof?"

"Just follow me," Soren said sternly before taking the lead just as Haar returned with a battle axe in his hands and a disgusted look on his face.

"They ate my wyvern! Damn things _ate my wyvern!_" he exclaimed. Just then, Hector, Saleh, and Eliwood raced into the hall, looking exhausted, with faces and hands bruised and cut, and clothes covered in dust and soot.

"We can't hold them off any longer!" Eliwood announced. "They got Duessel and they've demolished the main hall!"

"Duessel's dead?" Ephraim said with a lowered voice.

"How will we tell that to Amelia?" Erika added with concern.

"You'll have to wait to tell her the bad news," Hector responded. "If we don't do something soon, we'll be joining Sir Duessel in the realm of the dead!"


	22. Chapter 21

"_Greetings, readers. As you read in the introduction of the previous chapter, Gigatron has shoehorned me into being his muse. So, here I am musing and introducing you to chapter 21 of _Basilisk's Reign. _Now I realize there are a few people out there who really seem to like this fic, but honestly, to me it seems like a Sci-Fi Channel monster-of-the-week Saturday night suckfest set in the _Fire Emblem _universe. And with names like 'Grave Digger', 'Rangefinder', and 'Blowout', the villains sound more like rejected characters from a 1980s_ _cartoon than characters in a fan fiction._

_But I digress for now. Without further ado, here is chapter 21."_

-Lethe

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Soren led Sain up the stairs into the attic, and out a window onto the roof. A cold, chilling wind blew and the main hall was reduced mostly to a massive heap of rubble, only a few battered wall sections still standing. An arm, encased in dented armour, was visible sticking out from beneath the wreckage; no doubt Duessel. Next to a tree was a crushed and twisted black mass; no doubt once Haar's wyvern. But there were no basilisks in sight. Soren summoned a gust of wind to lift a few pieces of rubble into the air and twirl them about. Sain didn't quite understand, however.

"Can't you just shoot a few fireballs into the sky, or something?" the knight asked.

"I'd be able to if I'd thought to bring a fire tome," Soren answered. "Admittedly, that was a lack of foresight on my part. But surely if the Crimean army or perhaps a battalion of Begnion pegasus knights see debris floating in the air above the forest, they'll want to investigate."

Meanwhile, Saleh had gathered Ike, Eliwood, and Ephraim into one of the bunk rooms, explaining more about basilisks.

"This is the worst basilisk situation I've ever seen," Saleh mused. "Granted, this is only the third or fourth basilisk situation I've ever seen, but usually there's only one or two. You seem to have at least four on your hands here."

"So you've faced these things before," Ephraim assumed. "Good to know we have a veteran in this field on our side."

"You know, I think I may have another weapon that could help," Ike piped up. "A golden sword called Ragnell. It can pierce armour of any kind and is imbued with magic that allows it to attack from a distance as well as up close. It was either blessed or forged by the Goddess, either or."

Saleh nodded slowly. "A blade that the Goddess herself took part in creating," he said thoughtfully. "That could quite likely help."

"So we have everything we need to defeat these beasts, then?" Eliwood inquired.

"It would certainly seem that way. However, I should warn you; responding to the parent basilisk when it speaks to you can reveal everything about yourself with every word," Saleh warned. "If he tries to talk to you, ignore him. I cannot stress this enough! If he finds you have a dark secret, or a past filled with pain or sorrow, he can exploit your deepest desires and fears and reduce you to a maddened, mindless shell of your former self."

This warning made Ike worry. It made him worry about Soren. The mage harboured both a dark secret and a painful past. If this was revealed to the parent basilisk, then he would destroy Soren from inside out with ease. _But I shouldn't be too concerned, _Ike thought. _Soren is smart enough to know not to respond to it. _With this in mind, he pushed the worry to be back of his mind and went to his quarters to find Ragnell.

Back on the roof, Soren was still twirling pieces of debris around in the air while Sain nervously scanned the ground below. Every once in a while, something would let out an unearthly howl in the distance, making them both wary and tense, only to relax a bit a few moments later when nothing else happened. Finally, the knight decided to strike up a conversation, to lighten the mood a bit.

"Say, Soren," said Sain, "do your thoughts ever turn to a young man's fancy?"

"Excuse me?"

"I may as well be blunt- Soren, have you ever been in love?"

"Of course not," the mage was quick to reply.

"No? Never? You've never had a bonny lass catch your eye?" Sain asked.

"No, not ever." Soren wanted to make this perfectly clear, although earlier that night, a bonny lass _had _caught his eye: Natasha. But that was far from love. "Now let me ask you a question. Do you try to woo every woman you meet, just for the fun of it?"

Sain's silly grin faded a bit. "Not every woman... Most, but not all," he said somewhat hesitantly. "It's compulsive, I swear. I do it weather I want to or not. It's not something I'm at all proud of, but..."

Soren interrupted him. "Then why don't you just resist the urge?"

"I don't know! I've certainly tried, but the habit never seems to die, always coming back just when I think I've finally overcome it!"

"Alright, calm down. You've tried, at least. That's more than can be said for some people."

Zihark, Hector, and Haar had appointed themselves to stand watch outside, although Sain and Soren already did that. As expected, as soon as Haar found a suitable post behind a demolished wall in the ruins of the main hall, he fell asleep. Hector stationed himself at the back door, and Zihark had opted to hide out in a few bushes. Not the best places to survey the area for giant vampiric snakes, but it was the best they could do at the moment. Inside what remained of the main fort, Erika had returned to her quarters to sleep at Ephraim's request, while Ephraim himself formulated a plan of action with Saleh, Eliwood, and Ike.

"The surrounding buildings should have the supplies we need to hold out until help arrives," Ike explained, rolling out a map of the immediate area that he scribbled down a few moments earlier. It was sloppy and rushed, but still mostly legible, so it was good enough for now. "We have an infirmary down here, in case we have wounded, and this building here is the mess hall, so we don't have to worry about hunger and dehydration. The structure just behind the main fort is the armoury."

"There is the risk of them waiting outside for us to try and reach one of these buildings to consider, however," Ephraim added.

"True. How can we detect them if they're under the ground?" Ike speculated.

"I'd assume Lethe would be able to hear or smell them," Saleh suggested.

"Lethe, of course! Where is she, by the way?"

Lethe had snuck out to the mess hall, as she hadn't eaten anything save for a strip of dried meat or two. Now she made herself a meal of a trout stored in a barrel of brine. She scaled and filleted the fish with the dagger she kept tied around her leg. Then she carved the bones out and cut the flesh into smaller, more manageable pieces.

"That looks good," hissed the parent basilisk's voice. Following Saleh's instructions, Lethe ignored him. "What, you're not talking to me any more?" The horrible stench of rotting corpses filled the air suddenly and the floorboards groaned as something moved slowly underneath them. "I cans see you up there, you know."

Lethe froze.

"Hark! Thine beast hath intruded upon the lands of wretched Crimea!" another voice exclaimed. Lethe vaguely recognized it. She thought for a moment. No, that couldn't be right. Then something tapped against the wall outside. Slowly, Lethe looked out the window closest to the tapping, and saw Blowout looking back at her.

"Bastian?!" Lethe exclaimed. "Good lord, Bastian, what's happened to you?!"

"Not Bastian, half-breed, its Blowout now," the parent basilisk corrected her.

"...Blowout?" Lethe wondered aloud. "That's a pretty stupid name."

"Bah! Thy name, Lethe, art not dissimilar to the river of forget in the underworld!" Blowout spat.

"So I have the same name as the unholy river of forgetfulness," Lethe said thoughtfully. "Hm... that might explain why I could never remember to help my mother clean the berries after foraging."

A distant whisper in his mind awoke Haar. His eye fluttered open, just in time to see Blowout slither in through a window into the mess hall. He grabbed his axe and looked up onto the roof. Sain and Soren had long since abandoned their posts. Haar rushed into the bunk room where Ike, Eliwood, Ephraim, and Saleh were planning.

"Could you please knock next time?" Eliwood questioned.

"No time for that, they've come back!" Haar reported. "They're raiding the mess hall!"

"Fiends! They'll eat our pie!" Ike exclaimed, clenching his fist. The five rushed out to see Blowout squirming around on the ground, trying to remove a mass of ginger fur from his face.

_That explains where Lethe is, _Ike thought. Finally, Blowout managed to pry Lethe off of him with his tail, but before he could do anything, she struggled out of his grip and retreated to the west of the mess hall to the infirmary. Then the serpent saw the group of on looking beorc, a nice straight row of bowling pins waiting to be blown down. Hesucked in air, puffing himself up like a balloon, and then exhaled sharply, tearing up bushed and stones, sending a wall of debris at the group!

In response, Saleh summoned a wall of fire that blocked all of the projectiles, as well as the next gust that followed it. Soon, Blowout was completely out of breath, and became immobile. Saleh lowered the barrier, and Ephraim saw opportunity. He raised Seigmund above his head, ready to strike he charged forward, and in a motion that required his whole body to move in this one motion, hurled the lance towards the prone demon!

Seigmund hit its mark, going right into Blowout's left eye! The monster screamed in agony and writhed like a giant grotesque worm, before slowly coming to a stop and hissing his death rattle.

One down, three to go.


	23. Chapter 22

Despite Blowout's death happening near by, Zihark had managed to sleep through the whole thing, something more expected of Haar. However, the Swordmaster couldn't be blamed; it was a long trip from Goldoa to Ike's HQ. The parent basilisk wasn't satisfied with his attempts to antagonize Lethe, unfortunately. Now he was going to try his hand elsewhere.

"Wake up and smell the carcass," the demon hissed into Zihark's mind. "You missed all the fun. Don't worry, though, you and me are going to have some fun of our own right now."

Zihark, having only just work up, didn't remember what Saleh told him. "What… Where are…?" he began. Then it hit him. "…Crud." He fell silent and began completely still.

"Oh no, please, go on," the basilisk urged. "You're boring me. You won't like me when I'm bored. So you're an activist for half-breed rights, eh?"

Zihark felt a pang of anger within him, but he didn't respond.

"Those filthy animals deserve their own rights, now? Heh… it's amusing how foolish and weak beorc-kind has become, really. Keep this up, and you'll have Branded popping up all over the place." 'Branded' was the term for someone born of beorc and laguz parents, and could be identified by marks on their foreheads. As one might assume, the Branded were rarely taken kindly to.

Zihark was becoming quite upset now, but he still said nothing.

"Still won't talk?" the basilisk questioned. "Fine. I'll make you talk, you bleeding-hearted fool. There's only one thing I hate more than half-breeds: soft-minded gits like you who protect them. The beorc are Ashera's chosen. Get back on your high horse and act like it! Here's a good idea; stop whining about the 'unjust enslavement' of the poor little freakshows!"

Now Zihark was furious. He couldn't hold his tongue any longer. "You know what I think of racist cads like you?!" he spat, quietly so any of his comrades nearby couldn't hear him, "I think _you _are the ones who should shut up, and not only let 'bleeding-hearted fools' like me whine about the unjust discrimination against laguz, but also _listen _to us!"

For a moment, there was no reply. Then, the basilisk chuckled. "Thank you for your co-operation," the monster hissed. "You've given me a very interesting bit of information. Its idiocy to think a loving relationship between a human and a half-breed could ever work out. At one time, however, you didn't seem to realize that. And neither did dear Alria."

"…Alria?"

"Yes, your precious little cat-freak Alria. You left her alone in a world that hated her," the basilisk taunted. "You left her to die in that frozen wasteland."

"No…" Zihark protested, "I didn't leave her to die! The Laguz Emancipation Army was coming to find her! I said good-bye, then she went with hem. That's what happened."

'Ah, I can see it now… Your final embrace with your beloved monster. I'd say now is a good time for a flashback!"

Zihark felt a wave of cold rush over him, and then, suddenly he found himself in the desolate snowfields of Daein during the winter. A tall oak tree, petrified from the cold, stood alone in the blanket of white., as two figures sat at its base. These two, Zihark saw, where himself, and a petite laguz woman around his age, only her face visible under her heavy robes. Vibrant yellow eyes on a soft young face decorated by hair as white as the snow surrounding the couple cascading down over her forehead and thin facial stripes of the same colour: Alria.

"When did the LEA say they'd be here again?" Alria asked. "I'm sorry, I keep forgetting!" She laughed a little at her own forgetfulness. How dearly Zihark missed that laughter.

"They said they'd meet us at a petrified tree in the middle of a frozen wasteland after we gave the signal," Zihark heard his past self reply. "Here we are, sitting under a petrified tree in the middle of a frozen wasteland after giving the signal. They should be here soon." Alria smiled, relieved after once again gaining this knowledge, and rested her head on his shoulder. Then there was silence, a silence that made Zihark squirm as he watched these events play out, as he knew what would come next.

"You know," Alria said suddenly, "it's not like we couldn't get married. I know some people who could marry us, and then we could keep our relationship a secret. It wouldn't be as hard as you think."

Zihark watched the face of his past self contort into an expression of pain. He remembered what he was thinking then, and he was thinking it again at that very moment of the present. _No, Alria, it would be as hard as I think. _

"Actually…" Zihark was hesitant to reply. "It… You see, Alria, it isn't that easy keeping something like that a secret." The Zihark of the present felt the same sorrow as the Zihark of the past as he spoke these words.

"But I'm sure we could do it somehow," Alria retorted. Ignorance is bliss.

"Someone would discover it eventually! If the news reached the wrong ears, we could both be executed," Zihark argued.

"…But… No, we could do it!" Alria tried to convince her lover as well as herself. "We could make it work! No one would ever know!"

"Alria… I'm sorry, but for your safety… This can't happen. If the wrong people knew, we'd be hunted down and killed. I don't care if that happens to me so long as you are allowed to live the rest of your life in peace and happiness, but… I won't take that risk. I-I… I'm sorry."

Alria just stared at first. She didn't do or say anything for a while. Then, a single tear rolled down her. Cheek. Then another, and another. Zihark shed a few tears as well. Both the past and present Zihark shed tears. Then the past Zihark pulled something out of his outer coat; a bronze locket, and put it around Alria's neck.

"I have to go now," he said in a hushed tone. "I'm sorry… I'm so sorry…"

Then, they kissed. Gently, they way innocent young lovers do. Zihark and Alria were innocent young lovers in a forbidden romance. But now, Zihark regretted leaving her. He watched his past self stand up, turn around, and slowly walk away. _No, you fool, don't leave her, _he thought, _you idiot, stay with her. _But he didn't. He left Alria there alone. Then the flashback ended, and Zihark found himself where he started, huddled in a bush in the woods.

"Ah, young love," the basilisk said. "How sweet it is until reality sets in, and you realize that you can't be wed and have a long, happy life with a sub-human."

"Shut up…" Zihark spat. "Don't you dare call her that."

"Who? The half-breed you misled and left to freeze to death?"

"She didn't freeze to death out there! The LEA came and found her!"

"Ha! Wishful thinking! Nice locket, by the way. Shame you had to waste it on her."

"SHUT UP!" Zihark shouted as loud as he could. Then, momentary silence.

"Excuse me," someone asked behind the hunched-over Zihark, scaring him nearly out of his skin. "Who are you yelling at?" The Swordmaster slowly turned his head, and saw a confused-looking Erika staring at him.

"…No one. Just having a nightmare."


	24. Chapter 23

Blowout's body was burned, although the corpse was surrounded by a ring of scented candles to lessen the resultant stench. Up until now it was uncertain how exactly Bastian died, but Lethe had confirmed that the cause of death was an infant basilisk bursting from his chest. After a few hours of nothing else happening, the garrison decided it was time to bed down. However, there was a shortage of cots, and so some were forced to share a bed; Sain was forced in with Haar, Ephraim ended up with Hector, Zihark found himself in the same bed as Soren, and in what proved to be the most awkward of these, Ike and Lethe ended up sleeping on the same mattress.

Ike's quarters, formally the quarters of his father Greil, was a bit more luxurious than the others, but not much more. The mattress was a bit softer, and the covers were a bit more covering and warming, but other than that it was like the other bunks; cold and hard, like sleeping on a loaf of bread left out in the winter's winds. Ike was feeling a bit of anxiety at the moment. He imagined what kinds of ground rules Lethe might lay down to a beorc sharing a bed with her.

He was surprised not to hear a word from her as she joined him. They laid there, both feeling an awkward silence, with their backs turned to one another. Occasionally her tail would flitter up into his face for a moment, making him cough or sneeze. These sudden gusts of air would make her ears twitch. Needless to say, they were having difficulties sleeping with each other's physical presence; Ike for a different reason than Lethe.

Ike could feel the bare skin of her back on his elbow. He recounted hearing something light and soft hitting the floor before Lethe got into the bed, but with the candles blown out and curtains drawn, he couldn't see just how much she had taken off before getting under the covers, but it was clear she had at least removed her tunic. This made Ike grimace as he stared into the darkness. His main concern was keeping his hands to himself as much as humanly possible; if he came across as a pervert to Lethe she'd likely tear his manhood off.

Ike himself only removed his gloves, gauntlets, head band, cape, belt, and boots to sleep, and that was when he was in a relatively safe indoor bed. When he had to sleep out in the wilderness during an assignment as a mercenary, he didn't remove anything to sleep. A bare ankle brushed against his foot, and with it, came more unease into the young man's mind. Several uncomfortable moments passed before breathing, peaceful, steady, breathing, could be heard. Lethe had managed sleep, but this didn't comfort Ike at all.

Lethe shivered a little, and then rolled over almost on top of Ike. Indeed, there was a draft coming in through the window Ike had forgotten to close. The awkwardness of the situation had increased tenfold. _Oh crud, _the beorc thought. _Oh CRUD. No, not crud- Oh SHIT. _He looked over his shoulder and saw why Lethe was so cold. She'd kicked most of the covers off of herself, and the awkwardness increased exponentially again, but at least it dispelled the fear that she'd come to bed in nothing; she still wore leather undergarments. Ike slowly, cautiously, as to not wake her, pulled the covers back up over her scantily clad form. _Dammit Lethe, why are you doing this to me? _

Once that was done with, Ike began to feel the urge to take a cold shower. Then he felt the urge to punch himself in the face for feeling the urge to take a cold shower. He resisted both urges quite well, and once again tried to manage sleep. But he couldn't, as Lethe kept shifting around until she had finally squirmed her way over to the farthest side of the bed from Ike. The awkwardness became more bearable, as Ike sighed in relief. He sighed a little too loud. Lethe looked over her shoulder at him, and their eyes met.

"…Can I help you?" Ike managed to ask.

"You handled that well. I'm impressed," Lethe replied.

"…What? 'I handled that well?'"

"Yes, you handled it well. You didn't try anything. See, I can never seem to sleep comfortably fully clothed. It's made Ranulf uncomfortable a great many times."

"Why didn't you tell me that before?" Ike questioned. "I've been living in fear of you ripping off my… mine because I did something wrong for at least a half hour now!"

"I was testing you," Lethe answered obviously.

"Why?! What were you testing for?!"

"To see if you'd give me any trouble tonight. But it seems you won't so you can stop worrying about your potential castration now." With that, Lethe rolled over onto her back and fell asleep- for real this time. Ike's left eye twitched a little, but he still rolled over onto his side facing away from Lethe, and was able to fall asleep.

"Wake up, boy!" a commanding and proud voice ordered. "I don't believe I was done with you."

Ike opened his eyes. He knew the voice well. He pulled himself into a sitting position and did a double take at the speaker. There, clad in black armor and an orange cape, with brown hair atop his head and a huge nose that vaguely resembled a bird's beak, was Ike's father, Greil!

"F-father?!" Ike stuttered.

"Yes, it is I! Now listen well, son, I'm contacting you from beyond the grave and I've only ten minutes to speak to you," Greil explained. Then he saw Lethe, who had kicked the covers off of herself again, and looked back at his son with a mischievous smile. "I told you staying in Gallia was a good idea."

Ike felt as though he were about to burst into flames from the embarrassed blushing. "Getting back on topic, father," he urged.

"Right then. The parent basilisk is an old foe of Crimea and Gallia," Greil explained.

"Is it the Black Knight?" Ike guessed.

"No, the parent basilisk is King Ashnard. His lair is what used to be Daein Keep."

"Gasp! I should have known!"

"Yes. There is something under this bed that you should see," said Greil before his eyes wandered back to Lethe. "And who might this be?"

"That's Lethe. Please don't assume anything. I swear this isn't what it looks like."

Greil simply smiled. "Of course it isn't. I must go now. Fare thee well, my son. Don't foul up, or all of Tellius, nay, the world will suffer for you failure!" With that, he disappeared into the air, and Ike awoke from the dream. Immediately, he got out of the bed and looked under the bed. Nothing but blackness. He reached into the dark and felt around. He briefly grasped what felt like a handle bar. He'd have to push the bed aside. But that meant he'd have to deal with Lethe first.

Ike gently put a hand on Lethe's shoulder. He was about to wake her when she began to talk in her sleep.

"Oh, you want some more of that, Daein?" she whispered in a harsh tone. She was slurring the S's horribly. "I can get you more of that… how 'bout I apply it directly to your prejudiced little brain?" Despite threatening to maul someone in her dreams, there was something about her, curled up in a ball, her cheek resting on her palm.

_Awww, ain't that cute, _Ike thought. Again came the urge to fist himself. Once her death threats and hissing at the non-existent foe ended, Lethe became silent in her slumber, and her usual cynical, cold expression melted away into serenity and peace. She was now sleeping quite deeply. For a moment, she didn't even look like Lethe. But of course, she was anything but cute and peaceful, so Ike re-focused himself on waking her.

But she looked so at rest that he simply couldn't bring himself to wake. Her. So then, with judgment impaired by lack of sleep, and perhaps something else, Ike attempted to move the bed without waking Lethe.

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_For anyone who thought this chapter was a bit of perverted claptrap, don't bother bringing it up in your reviews. Gigatron is already quite an earful about it from me._

-Lethe


	25. Chapter 24

_Gigatron finally got _Radiant Dawn_ today, but he refuses to play it until he's finished this fic to avoid continuity errors and characterization problems. One would think he'd play it first to help with that, but instead here he is listening to Dragonforce writing _Basilisk's Reign. _He's rather stubborn about this like this._ _No worries, though. I'll see if he'll let me have a go and I'll tell you if RD_ _is any good. _

-Lethe

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Soren had opted to write a report of the most efficient strategies, techniques, and forms of attack to use against the basilisks rather than sleep. He could seldom sleep anyway. Writing with quill and ink upon one of his many spare scrolls, the mage had already come up two pages of ways to most effectively combat the enemy. These scrolls would be added to the HQ's library, where information was kept on everything from slaying monsters to cooking an omelette.

It was the early hours of the morning, only a few more hours until sunrise, when Soren had finished his paperwork and added it to the archives. Now he had to check the records and funds, and then maybe he could try to get a few hours of sleep. But then…

"Aren't you getting tired?" Ashnard said with a certain maniacal edge to his voice. Soren ignored him, but it was too late to hide his secrets from this demon. "I've been listening but never speaking to you. You have little left hide from me. So you're Branded, hm? You've had a hard life because of it, it seems. Most unfortunate."

"…"

"It's too late to ignore me. You don't like the idea of more Branded coming into the world, do you? You're afraid of your own kind?"

"Go… Away," Soren demanded. The fiend probing his mind was touching on a very personal issue.

"Here's a hypothetical question: What if you had to spend the rest of your life with another Branded?" Ashnard asked, his sadistic glee growing steadily with every word.

"What do you mean?" Soren was becoming uneasy.

"This is just speculation, but what if, say… Ike had something to do with the conceiving of another Branded?"

"…He never would. Now leave me alone, I have more important matters to attend to."

"Oh, he never would? Not even with his half-breed lady love?"

"What are rambling on about?!"

"How about with that little cat? Lethe, her name was? It's plausible. You won't even entertain the idea?" The parent basilisk spoke in a tone of mock disappointment.

"Of course not. Ike is involved with Queen Elincia." Soren replied in an irritated tone.

"…And Queen Elincia is involved with General Geoffrey. She and Ike have not a thing to do with each other. But he and Lethe, there's evidence of that. There's something in the way they speak to each other, they way they look at each other, the way they act around each other. Lethe is less hostile around Ike, like he calms and reassures her somehow. Ike acts like less of an oblivious moron around Lethe. You may not be as smart as you let on if you can't see it."

"Ridiculous!" Soren exclaimed. "I can't see their spark because they have no attraction to each other!"

Ashnard chuckled. "They don't, do they? Let me help you rethink that."

Soren was blinded for a moment by a flash of white light that came from nowhere. Once he regained his vision, he found himself in the forest behind the HQ. It was broad daylight, with birds chirping and flitting through the flower-scented air. It must have been Spring. Lethe, in her cat form, lay against the trunk of a great oak tree, fast asleep. Ike was nowhere to be seen, and neither was a Branded child, for that matter.

"There's nothing here," Soren said harshly. "Take me back. You're wasting my time and yours on a vision of a sleeping cat."

"Just watch," Ashnard insisted. "I think you'll find this very interesting."

A bush rustled, and a small beorc boy, likely no older than six or seven, approached Lethe's sleeping form. He wore a head band, large and dark in colour, placed carefully over his forehead. He had a small sack full of various herbs and flowers in his little hands. The boy's hair was the same colour as Lethe's, but instead of her organized straight hair his was messy; not unlike Ike's. But surely that couldn't be the case. It couldn't be. The boy set the sack down under Lethe's nose and lightly tugged one of her ears. After a moment, her eyes fluttered lazily half-open.

"I wish you'd stop doing that, my child," Lethe calmly mumbled. _Wait… 'My child'? Calmly mumbled? _Soren was juggling Lethe's words in his mind, before finally coming to the conclusion that this boy was not beorc, but instead her Branded child. That explained the head band.

"I couldn't remember which herbs you wanted, but I think these are the right ones," the boy admitted. "Are they, mother?"

Mother? This was definitely Lethe's Branded child. Perhaps it was just denial, however, but Soren refused to believe that Ike was the father. He considered numerous other possibilities, most of which were far fetched and plain silly, but some vaguely possible, if only to certain extents. Lethe stretched and sniffed the sack.

"Oh, yes, these are," she said with uncharacteristic happiness. "Excellent, Nathaniel! Oscar should be able to make wonderful soup from this." Oscar was a lance knight in the Greil Mercenaries. He was also an excellent cook. The boy allowed himself a proud smile before a look of uncertainty crept into his eyes.

"When did father say he'd be back?" Nathaniel asked. Lethe changed to her human form and beckoned the boy to sit by her side, which he did.

"Your father… Hm, I admit I can't remember when he said he'd be back, either," she said. "He'll likely be back soon, though. Now, let me see your forehead."

Nathaniel bent closer to Lethe, and she carefully removed his head band, and there on the boy's forehead, Soren saw, under a thinning layer of skin-coloured paint, was the mark of the Branded. _No one ever painted over my mark or let me have a headband,_ the mage thought with a dry laugh.

"The paint's thinning," Lethe said with concern. "But I don't think we need to reapply it today. The sun won't be shining much longer, and the band usually suffices anyway." She pulled the head band back down to its usual place on her son's forehead.

"This is all very interesting, but I honestly have things to do," Soren protested. "Release me from this illusion. Don't you have villages to terrorize or livestock to devour?"

"But don't you want to see who the father is?" Ashnard inquired with a tone grossly parodying concern.

"I get scared when father goes out sometimes," Nathaniel said ashamedly, as though being concerned for one's father was something worthy of scorn or ridicule. Lethe smiled and gently stroked the boy's messy ginger hair, the way a truly loving mother does. For a moment, Soren wondered if this was someone who only closely resembled Lethe, as these actions were extremely out of her character.

"He'll be fine. He's always managed to come out on top," she reassured her son. That helped to rule out Ike as the father. Ike did often emerge victorious, but not always, so far as Soren knew. Nathaniel's eyes were focused solely on Lethe's ears.

"Why don't I have funny ears like you?" the child asked. Soren expected the Lethe he knew to shine through, if only for a moment. But instead, this strange, motherly Lethe only laughed a bit before poking Nathaniel's nose lightly.

"I'm not sure, but doesn't it help to have your father's huge nose?" she asked. This reassured Soren some more; Ike's nose was a relatively normal size.

"The father isn't Ike," the mage huffed as though it were a concrete fact. "Will you release me now?"

"Be patient," Ashnard hissed. "This is the best part."

Nathaniel looked away from his mother for a moment, and a joyful smile spread across his face. "Father!" the boy exclaimed as he leapt from Lethe's side. Soren's gaze followed the child's trail. The mage's jaw dropped as his eyes went wide as the father was revealed.

"No…" Soren pleaded silently, "No, that can't be!"

The father was Ike, and indeed, his nose _was _now huge. He knelt down to his son. "Hey there! How's my little buddy today?" Ike beamed. "You haven't been pestering your mother, have you?"

"No, he's gotten better," Lethe confirmed. "He didn't step on my tail this time."

"It was an accident," Nathaniel insisted.

"We all know it was an accident," Ike announced, "no hard feelings, alright?"

Soren watched in horror. He choked on the words as he spoke. "No Ike, y-you couldn't have! Not… Not with _her_!" Emotions of rage, confusion, and disappointment flooded into Soren's mind and mixed together. He felt light-head for a moment as tears began to well up in his eyes. Then he tried to regain his composure, to no avail.

"Bah! So you're only friend did it with a sub-human and conceived a Branded, what's wrong with that?" Ashnard was taunting more than asking. "Oh, right; you loathe and fear your own kind. What ever happened to the 'We freaks have to stick together' attitude?"

"Th-This can't be true! This is nothing more than an illusion you concocted to torment me!" Soren sobbed.

"Oh no, this is what the future has in store. But wait- there's more… Look closely at that tree in the background."

Soren looked around until he spied a tree with a dark figure hiding behind its trunk. Upon closer inspection, this figure was none other than a future version of himself, with wild, bloodshot eyes watching the family with hate, his face even more pale than it was now. This depraved vision of himself disturbed Soren more than anything else in the vision. The flash came again, and the mage found himself back in the library. He was stunned; horrified.

"You can prevent that, you know," the demon offered. "It's as simple as killing the mother."

"Kill Lethe?"

"Yes. Slit her throat while she sleeps. Take her deep into the forest and burn her. Anything will do!"

"No… No, there has to be another way," Soren protested.

"What's this? You hate her, and yet you can't bring yourself to prevent her from helping that horrible vision from becoming reality?" The basilisk was a bit surprised at this.

"If Ike really does love her, then I can't kill her, lest it hurt him. I don't want to cause him any pain, and yet I still can't allow myself to become that hateful, mindless thing… I'll use trickery and deception! I'll make them hate each other!"

"Oh? And how do you intend to do that?" Ashnard asked. Soren was silent; he hadn't a clue how he'd do that.

"I'll think of something. Give me time," Soren replied after a momentary silence.

"You don't have much time. You know they share a room tonight. For all you know, they could be well at work conceiving their unholy child now. Hire Volke; he should get the job done."

"…Volke?"

"You remember the assassin from the campaign against Daein, don't you? He lives in the forest not far from here. Hire him to take of the cat. If you can't bring yourself to eliminate her, then surely he will."

Soren thought it over for a moment. Then he made his decision. He went down to the HQ's vault, took several bags full of gold coins, and headed out into the dark woods.

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Please review if you can, and if you have the time, please point out any grammar errors you find. I'd also like to thank the dedicated readers (this fic has over 1400 hits, so clearly there has to be some people who keep coming back for more.)


	26. Chapter 25

_Wait a minute, what in the hell am I doing? _Soren stopped in the middle of the darkened forest. Although it was still mostly black in the trees, the first rays of morning sunlight were beginning to break through the clouds. But they couldn't find a way in through the branches and leaves yet. _Saving my sanity and Ike's pride, _he eventually answered himself before soldiering on. After a few moments of wandering almost blindly, the mage came to what on the surface looked like a dilapidated shack. This must have been Volke's place. For someone who charged gold for every little thing he was asked to do, Volke didn't seem to be living in much luxury.

Soren knocked on the moss-covered door. No answer. Then the door opened a crack, and a narrowed eye peered out.

"Ah, Soren. I had a feeling you'd come to me eventually," a monotonous, nigh-emotionless voice beamed. The door opened wider. "Come in, please." The eye disappeared, and after a moment of hesitation, Soren stepped into the wooden cube-like room. There was another door opened a few centimetres on the wall opposite to the door he'd just entered. The mage assumed this was where Volke went, and with that assumption in mind, he pulled the door aside and descended the stairs on the other side.

The stairway led down to many subterranean floors. Clearly much of Volke's hideout was underground. There were several doors, but all were locked except for the one at the very bottom of the stairs. The room on the other side was lit by a few candles hanging from a rusty chandelier. Other than that, the furniture consisted only of a desk and two chairs. A figure with a reddish-brown band around his forehead, carefully combed-back brown hair, wearing a dark- so dark it was almost black- brown cladding sat in one chair.

"Take a seat," the assassin said, gesturing to the unoccupied chair. Soren did as Volke said. "So why do you come to me? Do you need thievery or assassination?"

"Assassination," Soren confirmed. Volke bent in closer to him.

"So who's the guy?" he asked.

"Not a guy; a woman," Soren corrected.

"I think I may have an idea who this may be," said Volke. "Could this be that laguz girl Ike always had his eye on?"

Even Volke saw it, and yet Soren was oblivious? "Yes, that's her," Soren affirmed.

"Not happy with Ike's taste in women, I see. So where might I find her?" Volke inquired. Soren pulled a map of the surrounding area out of his robe and handed it to the shadowy figure. The area detail included Ike's HQ and the forest around it. The HQ was circled in black ink.

"Once the morning sun has arisen, go down to the showers and wait," Soren instructed, handing Volke another map of the headquarters. "Eventually, she should come."

"How would you like it down?" the assassin questioned further. "Should I put her out of her misery quickly, or should I take my time?"

"You didn't happen to hear any commotion earlier, did you?"

"Yes, I did. Sounded like earthquakes."

"We were under attack by giant demon serpents, and those things are still out there. What I think you should do, is do it quickly, and then take the body out to the forest and let the serpents have their way with it."

"Right then, I'll calculate the payment… Having to assassinate something that could easily detect me and retaliate with deadly force, that's 1200 gold right there, then there's how you want me to drag the body around and that adds 450 gold." Volke added the sums. "But you do want me to do something quick, which doesn't waste my time and let's you get away with 125 gold, however there's the matter of how you want me to let monsters eat the body, so I'll fine you 800 for that. Speaking of which, there's monsters on the loose, therefore threatening my well-being and adding 1380 gold to my payment. Finally, you want me to ruin Ike's love life, so I'll add 30 gold on top. That comes to a total of 3985 gold."

Soren had brought roughly 8000 gold in four large sacks. He expected Volke to charge more, but he almost sighed in relief at the confirmed payment. But he was bothered by the mention of ruining Ike's love life. Hiring an assassin to eliminate Lethe was hardly different from killing her himself; Soren was basically murdering her either way, and if Ike ever found out there'd be hell to pay.

"You look like you're reconsidering," Volke said, interrupting Soren's thoughts. "Is that your conscience or your gold talking?"

Soren placed two large bags of gold coins on the desk. "Neither," he said. Volke poured the bags out onto the wooden surface and for a moment a glint of joy shone in his eyes as he surveyed the heaping pile of 4000 coins before him.

"She'll be out of the way by tomorrow afternoon," Volke announced.

Ike was surprised at how heavy the bed was. Not only did it weigh a ton, he couldn't use his full strength, lest he awake Lethe. After hours of gently pushing the bed to the right, he had managed to push it far enough to see what his father said he needed to see under it; a door in the floor.

Lethe hadn't seemed to have been at all disturbed by Ike pushing the bed before, so eh decided to put a bit more strength into shoving it aside. Another hour later, bed was far enough to the right- with Lethe still sleeping soundly in it - that Ike could open the door.

The door hid a small bronze box, mostly rusted over but oddly not around the hinges, making it easier- and quieter- to open. Greil must have oiled it religiously. Ike heaved the box out and opened it. Inside was a journal; most likely his father's. This was confirmed when Ike blew the dust off and saw the title "Greil's Journal" carved into the leather cover. Removing the lock binding the book closed with the key on the hidden under the box, which he managed to find after some searching, Ike opened and began to read his father's journal.

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_Ooooh, a cliffhanger! I wonder if this will trigger a psychedelic flashback sequence. As long as it isn't peppered with beat-you-over-the-head-to-make-a-point religious/ disturbing imagery, that'll be fine with me. If hadn't noticed by now, this isn't Lethe. She OD'd on catnip last night and is currently in rehab- I'm not sure why she'd do that, but hopefully it's just her being foolish and experimenting rather than something serious- so I'll be musing the rest of the fic. And if I can't make it, then this drunken little alien named Corey will show up and muse. But hopefully that won't happen, as Corey knows little to nothing about either _Fire Emblem _or this fic, and not only that, but he's also constantly high or drunk or something similar._

_Again, Gigatron would like to thank the dedicated readers, and please, if you can, submit a review. That's all for now. _

-Ranulf


	27. Chapter 26

Guilt seemed to enshroud everything in a veil of mist. _How could you do this, _Soren asked himself. _How could you do that to Lethe, and by extension even worse to Ike? _The mage stopped and leaned against a tree to let things clear up. He told himself exactly what he told himself when hiring Volke: To save his own sanity as well as Ike's pride.

_Ike will find a new love, _Soren reassured himself. _Perhaps Marcia or Tanith… Yes, they had their eyes on him. He'll fall for one of them and forget all about Lethe, and this will all end happily._

"Soren?" a voice called out, removing Soren from his thoughts. "I heard that you left late in the night and came to find you. I sense an impurity in your soul…" Natasha said with worry as she approached him.

"Impurity?" Soren questioned after a round of startled panting.

"Yes, an impurity on your soul. What were you doing last night?"

"Last night…" Soren's heart was beating like a drum. "I… I visited… a friend last night. Yes, I left last night to visit a friend."

"Then perhaps the impurity is from a past act?" Natasha speculated.

"Yes, must be," Soren agreed, lying through his teeth.

"This act results in the death of another, another who did no wrong," Natasha looked more concerned with every word. Soren knew he couldn't lie his way out of this. Suddenly, something caught Natasha's eye, distracting her from the impurities. "Where ever did you get that horrible blemish on your forehead?"

"My forehead?" Natasha had noticed Soren's brand. "It's a tattoo."

"One you received on a drunken night and regret," the cleric asked, "or one you intend to keep?

Soren thought for a moment. Could this be a chance to be rid of the mark that had caused him so much pain in the past? Perhaps. "One I'd rather not have," the mage replied. Natasha had her healing staff in hand the whole time; so far as Soren knew she was always carrying it around where ever she went. She held it to Soren's forehead as the sapphire orb on the end of the staff began to hum softly and glow radiant blue. The orb hummed and glowed for a moment before it faded away.

"Hm… Its still there," Natasha announced. Soren was rather disappointed to hear this, but he decided to forget about this failed attempt- After all, he could just start wearing a head band.

"_Holy SHIT!_" Ike exclaimed upon finishing reading his father journal. He had read the book from cover to cover, reading everything his father wrote on the pages intently. As he took a moment of silence to comprehend what he just read, Lethe poked her head out from under the bed covers and stared at the back of his head with disdain.

"Is there any reason why you opted to shout profanity rather than ring the wake-up bell?" she asked. Ike slowly turned his head, almost 180 degrees, to look at her.

"We need to go to Daein Keep, and we need to bring this book with us," he said, holding up his father's journal.

"And the book holds _what _significance?" Lethe questioned further.

"It's my father's journal. I had to move the bed to get it. You wouldn't believe the stuff written in here!" Ike explained with wide eyes.

"If it's that exciting, either your father had a tendency to exaggerate things or you're just easily excitable," Lethe commented dryly. "So when do we depart?"

"As soon as we're all ready."

"Very well. I'll be sleeping 'til then." With that, Lethe curled back up under the covers and resumed her slumber. Ike opened the blinds and let the morning light stream in, and for a moment Lethe returned from Dreamland, only to go back a few moments later. In her sleep, she muttered more death threats at non-existent foes. Ike listened for a while, as it was rather amusing at first, but soon left due to Lethe's ramblings becoming frightening. His goal was now to awake the rest of the group.

Ike awoke Ephraim, Saleh, and Eliwood first, then Hector, Erika, and the others. The mess hall still stunk horribly from Blowout's burnt carcass, so breakfast consisted of the little in the fortress. Soren and Natasha only arrived during the briefing, in which Ike announced the group would set out for Daein Keep that afternoon, once the supplies were prepared.

The distress signal they sent last night still had yet to be answered. Since last night, only Zihark's account of basilisk activity was reported. Saleh was fascinated that the creature could give its victim visions. That was something that, as far as he knew, basilisks were up until now incapable of. Soren said nothing of his vision, although he wanted desperately to at least give Lethe a warning that an assassin waited for her in the showers. _No, it will be better when she's gone, _he kept telling himself. However, Soren simply couldn't convince himself that this was the way to resolve this problem.

Finally, his guilt won out. Soren would give Lethe one warning. One warning and that was all. He made his way to Ike's quarters, where she still slept, and knocked on the door.

"Mm… Wha..? Who is it?" Lethe asked drowsily from behind the door. Soren didn't answer. He simply opened the door a cracked and stuck his head in.

"Oh, its you," Lethe said with disappointment easily noticeable in her voice. "What do you want? Why do you reek of fear?"

"I just wanted to tell you…" Soren hesitated to continue.

"Wanted to tell me what?" Lethe inquired.

"…I just wanted to tell you… Be careful today. Watch your back." With that, the mage left, shutting the door behind him. There. He did it. He warned her. There was still a pang of guilt at the back of his mind, but it was lessened considerably. Soren wandered off to attend to his usual business.

_Be careful? Watch your back? _Lethe pondered what Soren told her. Perhaps he meant to be careful of the basilisks? No, everyone knew to be careful of that, and needed no reminding. Was there some other danger to her and her alone? Her mind wandered back to Geoffrey's speculations back in Malthrowin, when the parent basilisk first made its presence known. If the basilisks did come from Daein, that meant they may have been bred there to hunt down laguz. Daein's hatred of laguz was well known, so it seemed reasonable to assume that a creature that first appeared at their borders and claimed the life of several laguz was created and bred in Daein. She'd have to run this by Ike. Once she decided to get out of bed, that is.

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_Shame on Lethe, being so lazy! Also, am I the only one who was having flashbacks to Writer Awakened's _Half a Child _during the second paragraph? Gigatron himself admits he can't be praised for being totally original. Regardless, one can't help but think that Gigatron isn't completely against the Soren+Lethe pairing as he claims to be, after Soren gives Lethe a warning- a vague warning, but a warning nonetheless- that her life is in danger. Don't tell him that, though. He'll completely deny it._

_Speaking of Lethe's life in danger, we know now that her ending up in rehab due to catnip abuse was only her getting carried away and not suicidal tendencies/ depression/ what have you. She'll be out by next friday, but the fic will likely be done by then, so I'm still musing the rest of it._

-Ranulf


	28. Chapter 27

"If Ranulf is aware of all this, shouldn't he be mauling Volke?"

_-A review of the previous chapter._

_Believe me, I've tried to convince Gigatron to let me show up out of nowhere with the sole purpose of causing Volke sever bodily harm, but he insists that the assassin meet a different fate. Anyways, here's chapter 27. Enjoy._

-Ranulf

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The supplies were ready by noon. The group set out a half hour later. Erika told Amelia of Duessel's fate, but no tears were shed. Instead was a moment of silence where tears were on the verge of falling, but Amelia managed to hold them back. Then the trek to Daein began. It was theorized that the troupe would be easy to find when gathered in one whole group, so they divided themselves into three smaller regiments. Ike led Soren, Zihark, Haar, and Natasha. Eliwood had Hector, Lethe, and Sain following him. Ephraim was charged with leading Erika, Saleh, and Amelia.

"Eliwood, we're lost," Hector said after an hour or so of blind wandering. "We should let… Bah, what's her name…? Kitty girl here lead."

"Just so you know, I do have a name," Lethe reminded, half-scolding. "Would you like me to spell it out? Assuming you can even read?"

"Stop it, both of you. We're not lost, we're… That tree looks rather familiar… Fine, we're lost," Eliwood gave in at last.

"Then allow me to take the lead. The thick-head has a good idea for once," Lethe suggested with sharp tongue. For a moment Hector considered bringing Wolf Beil down on her, but then thought better of it. Sain did nothing but look around nervously, not unlike a scared rabbit. Every once in a while, one of those dreadful, unearthly howls would echo through the trees. By now it was safe to assume these were the howls of the basilisks. But no monstrous serpents appeared yet. Right now, a different danger stalked them from the trees.

Volke kept all his senses on the group, particularly Lethe, and nothing else. His dagger was always at the ready, but he could not use it until she was alone, and with these three bumbling fools accompanying her, the assassin figured he'd be waiting a while. Right now they had come to a complete stand-still and now bicker among themselves. _Go ahead, cat, say something they don't like so they send you away, _Volke thought with contempt. _Wander off alone so I may kill you and buy myself a nice new ivory pipe. I'll buy Ike a pipe as well. Never fear, he'll be so high by tomorrow night he won't even remember you._

Things were better with Ephraim and his company. The quartet was spared the inconveniences of ineptitude and disagree. Amelia was silent, and lacked her usual cheerfulness. In fact, the whole group was silent and cheerless. The death of Sir Duessel had affected them all, but they could only move on and accomplish the mission at hand so others would not feel their sorrow for their loved ones and friends.

Ike had much more difficulty, however. Soren stayed a few steps behind Natasha rather at directly at Ike's side, which struck the leader as a bit odd. Without his steed, Haar was rather slow and clumsy, perhaps because he was constantly so tired, or perhaps he was so used to using a wyvern to get around. Zihark looked like he was in a perpetual state of unease, like he'd recently seen something far worse than any demon serpent. After a while, the group stopped to rest near a rock formation jutting from the side of a tree-covered hill. Haar pulled Ike aside to a nearb river.

"I'm not sure if you've noticed, but Soren's been acting odd since we've left," Haar told Ike in a hushed tone, which didn't seem nessecary to Ike, since the others were a good distance away, hidden by bushes and trees.

"I have noticed that he seems drawn to that cleric," Ike confirmed. "Is that what you mean?"

"That, and can't bear to look you in the eye. He can't seem to bear to look at you at all," Haar explained.

"You suspect he may be up to something?"

"Possibly. He seems particularly wary of Lethe. He was always looking over her shoulder behind her, like he expects something to pop out of the bushes at her back, in which case he may jump to her defence."

"…How do you mean?"

"Ike, I may sleep more than any man ever should, but I'm not a fool. I can see as well as you'd be able to if you'd just bother to look that something isn't right with Soren."

"I never said you were a fool, but I haven't…" Just then, Ike saw the bushes behind Haar looked discoloured- blue and purplish.

"What? What is it?" Haar questioned. Suddenly, a clawed tendril shot out of the underbrush and embedded itself into Haar's back! Ike drew Ragnell and lobbed the tentacle off as its victim lurched forward. With the tendril's severing came a shriek- a loud, ear-shattering scream that made Ike drop his blade and cover his ears- and then he appeared. Ashnard, the parent basilisk, stuck his grey head out of the foliage and hissed with such venom that this hiss seemed to kill the plant life around its emitter.

"Sir Ike! My how you've grown," Ashnard sneered, his mouth not moving in sync with his words but instead still talking via telepathy. "Especially your nose. You're growing up to be just like your father! So you've found love with a beast-woman, I hear. How touching. Love truly can breach any borders."

The serpent's lips pulled away from its teeth in a gross mockery of a smile, allowing thousands of jagged, sword-like teeth to jut out of its mouth like a bushel of bramble thorns. Saliva coated its teeth and lips as it slowly dragged its massive form towards Ike. Soon Ike could smell its fetid breath.

"Of course, such love can never last," the demon said in a tone of condescending pity. "It seems your good friend Soren disapproves of your taste in women. So much that he's hired an assassin to get rid of her. And if the assassin fails, he may attempt to do it himself, and that couldn't possibly end well." While Ashnard spoke, he allowed its tentacles to rip and tear at the prone Haar. Ike couldn't bear to look. Not at the fate befalling Haar or at this abomination before him.

"No, Soren wouldn't," Ike denied, "how could he?! You lie!"

"Oh, do I? Soren loathes your beast-girl. He loathes her because she's with you instead of him."

"…Wh-what? Did you just call Soren gay?!"

"You are his _only friend_. But no, not necessarily gay, more like he goes both ways. He seems to be interested in that Natasha, as well as you."

"More lies!" Ike readied Ragnell. "I'll take you here, monster! Your treachery and blood thirst will end here!"

"Put your stick down, boy. I was leaving anyway. But think long and hard about what I've told you." With that, the demon slithered backwards off into the forest, dragging Haar along with it. Ike stood there, alone and silent for a moment. Suddenly, he began to feel nauseous. He staggered back the way Haar led him before finally having to stop and grab a tree for support. The basilisk's breath still burned his nose. But Soren couldn't be any less straight then as straight as can be. It was impossible. Ike wouldn't even entertain he idea.

Lethe grew tired of Eliwood and Hector's bickering. Sain was getting on her nerves a bit as well, always looking like he had suffered a nervous breakdown. Lethe would have liked nothing more than to tell him to grow a spine. Then she noticed something and had an idea.

"I'll just leave you three alone for a while. My belly is as empty your heads," Lethe announced before going into her cat form and sauntering off. She didn't bother waiting for a response, as two of them were too busy arguing to hear her, and one was in a lesser state of shock.

_At last! Here's my chance_, Volke thought, a thin smile spreading over his lips. He watched Lethe slink away from her companions for a moment before beginning his pursuit.

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_By the way, Gigatron had been misspelling Siegmund (Ephraim's lance) this whole time._

-Ranulf


	29. Chapter 28

_Just going to sit there and wait for me, are you? _That's certainly what Lethe seemed to be doing as Volke closed in on his prey. She simply stood there and stared off into the underbrush. She had reverted to her human form as well. She had to be planning something. She had to have something in mind. Or she was simply much less intelligent and cunning than she seemed. Soon she was within striking of the assassin's knife. Soren's troubles would soon be over, and Volke would soon get his ivory pipe.

Just as the blade was about to plunge into Lethe's back, she whipped around and plucked the blade out of Volke's hand as her other hand grabbed his throat so tightly he could scarcely breathe. She did have a plan after all. _Bah, I should've known,_ Volke thought.

"Who sent you?" Lethe questioned, loosening her grip on the assassin's throat so he could speak, but still holding his own knife against his chest.

"Why are you threatening me with my knife?" Volke asked. "You have your own, use that."

"That doesn't answer my question," Lethe hissed. "I'm only going to ask you one more time: _Who sent you?_"

"The mage hired me," Volke answered at last. Lethe almost put her face to her palm. She should have known Volke's client would have been Soren. But she couldn't figure out why. Clearly the two would have to have a long conversation about this later. Lethe released her grip from Volke's throat but kept his knife.

"Go. Get out of my sight, assassin," she ordered. Whether Volke knew to listen to her or not, she'd never know. A volley of arrows arched out of the trees and struck the assassin down! The stench of alcohol filled the air as Rangefinder slithered down from the trees, taking a swig from his wine sack and taking aim at Lethe!

Lethe's first instinct was to find cover. Ducking behind a tree, Rangefinder's next volley missed by a mile- more likely because of the wine the beast was consuming rather than Lethe's grace. Now she had to counterattack. If only her foe would stop drunkenly spewing arrows everywhere long enough for her to do much of anything. The basilisk stopped momentarily to rear up and shriek its fury at its hidden enemy.

As Rangefinder screamed its drunken rage into the air, it didn't notice Hector and Eliwood coming up behind it. With a swing of Wolf Beil, Hector cut one of the strings of the creature's crossbow, causing an arrow to shoot into its head! The demon's shrieks stopped abruptly as it fell dead and twitching to the ground, hot blood pooling the grass around it once it fell. Although it was a nifty and ironic way to kill a monster with a crossbow built into its back, Hector was disappointed that Wolf Beil itself wasn't the cause of Rangefinder's death.

Regardless, that was one less basilisk to worry about.

"Bloody missed the thing," Hector lamented.

"You still killed it," Eliwood contradicted.

"Yes, but Wolf Beil missed it."

"Not entirely. It still hit the bowstring."

"True enough. Still, Wolf Beil didn't kill it, so it doesn't count."

"Not even for half?"

While they talked, Lethe peered out from around the tree trunk. Eliwood and Hector noticed the mortally wounded Volke, with a half dozen arrows stuck deep in his flesh, stuck to a short ridge of soil, giving the duo thumbs up for a job well done with his last dwindling ounce of energy before finally fading into death. Then they noticed Lethe.

"What happened to him?" Eliwood asked her.

"He tried to kill me, but the creature killed him instead," Lethe answered. "Now I have to find somebody. I'll meet back up with you later." Again, she sauntered off, leaving the Elibians to find their own way to Daein.

"Wasn't she put with us for the sole purpose of being our guide?" Eliwood wondered.

"I'm quite sure she was," Hector agreed. "But by the gods I swear she seems much more interested in deserting us."

Like a rabbit's ears hearing a hungry wolf on the prowl, Soren knew no good could come of Haar pulling Ike away from the rest of the group. The two had been gone for quite some time now. Did Haar suspect something was wrong? If so, did Ike suspect the same? Soren excused himself and wandered away, claiming he needed only to recover an item he believed to have dropped a while back. After the others were out of sight, the mage stopped himself.

_Now I'm simply being a paranoid fool! _Soren scolded himself for taking these precautions. He must have seemed very suspicious to the others. Especially Natasha. She had already seen that his soul was impure. With his leaving the group, what might she think of Soren now?

Then his thoughts turned to Lethe. Had Volke gotten rid of her? Did she still live? Was it really nessecary to kill her? Perhaps trickery was the answer. Or, more likely, Volke was simply a fool who saw bonds that weren't there and that Ashnard had told Soren nothing but horrible lies. Maybe Lethe and Ike were simply friends, maybe not even that. Still, if Haar had filled Ike's mind with suspicions, Soren had better not be there until he could think of something to expel these suspicions. He continued on his way.

The wind brought Soren's scent to Lethe's nose. _There you are, you wretch, _Lethe thought with anger as she made hast to the mage.

A bush rustled, and the cat burst from the underbrush before Soren, stopping him dead in his tracks.

"You and I, we need to talk," Lethe hissed. "I don't like you and I'm fairly certain that you don't like me, but hiring an assassin to kill me… You can't even be bothered to do it yourself if you hate me so?"

From Soren came no reply.

"The night before Ashnard's fall, we spoke in private. We worked out past hostilities. I thought we had come to good terms with each other at last. Oh, how you fooled me."

"We did work out past hostilities," Soren said finally. "But then new ones arose."

"…Ah, me and Ike? You believe we have a bond? I can't imagine why everyone thinks that. Me and him are friends at the most," Lethe explained. Soren was so gladdened by this confirmation that he nearly began laughing like a mad man while throwing his hands up to the sky and shouting "Hallelujah".

"Then I suppose I owe you an apology for hiring an emotionless killer to eliminate you," Soren admitted.

"Indeed you do. But I'll not be convinced you mean it until we have a long discussion about this. It couldn't have just been paranoia of me and Ike being an item that drove you to do this," Lethe speculated. "There's got to be more to it, and you're going to tell me all about it."

"She lies," Ashnard hissed into Soren's mind. "She wants nothing more than to be with him."

"But honestly, why would it matter to you if Ike and I _were _together?" Lethe asked. "Again, there's got to be more to it. Start talking."

"You don't have to tell her anything," said the basilisk, "Volke failed to do away with this vermin, but you have your chance to be rid of her once and for all right now."

"I'll tell you if you go into your human form," Soren bargained with Lethe. "I'm just not comfortable speaking with you like that."

"Yes, good… Lure her into a weaker state…"

Sure enough, Lethe changed back to her humanoid shape. "Now speak," she ordered.

_Now you kill her, _Soren thought, knowing the demon could hear words that never left his mind.

"Why would I kill her?" Ashnard questioned.

_If someone's been killed with magic, you can tell. If I kill her and someone stumbles upon her body, they'll know that I did it. You do it._

"Stop making me wait," Lethe said impatiently.

"I'll eat her corpse, but I won't kill her," Ashnard argued. "If I pounced upon her and devoured her, she'd squirm around in my throat while she's going down, and that's a very uncomfortable feeling. You kill her, and I will destroy the evidence."

…_If I must… Some monster you are, afraid to eat somebody because they'll move around as you swallow them…_

"If you haven't suddenly lost your voice, say something," Lethe demanded, now starting to become irritated.

"Well, the first I should tell you," Soren began, "is that I've developed a phobia of Branded… You know what Branded are, right?"

"The child of a beorc and a laguz, yes. Like you," Lethe answered.

"H-how did you…" Soren stuttered.

"Oh please, everyone knows you're Branded. You've left the mark out for all the world to see."

"…As I child, I was scorned and shunned, beaten and insulted by beorc and laguz alike for being Branded," Soren explained.

"Hence your dislike of laguz. I figured." Lethe rolled her hand, signalling for Soren to get on with it.

"Yes, but there's another part I've neglected to tell you until now… A part you really must hear."

"Oh?"

"Yes… I think you'll find this part very interesting indeed."

Grabbing the Elwind tome in his robe, Soren summoned a windstorm that covered the immediate area with cold gusts! Lethe was buffeted, and though she tried to shield herself, she was quickly overpowered. The frigid winds had caught her off-guard, and Soren would not relent his assault until she was down. The cat fell to her knees as her arms dropped limply to her sides, then she fell over onto her back, motionless and silent, and finally the winds came to a stop.

Soren was as silent and motionless as his victim for several moments.

"There, see how easy that was?" Ashnard sneered. "However, it would be wise to check and make sure she's good and dead."

Soren approached Lethe's still form and bent down to examine. She was sprawled out on her back, eyes open wide towards the sky. She drew no breath, and her body was limp and pale. She was dead. There could be not doubt of that.

_There. I killed her, and if Ike ever finds out he'll never forgive me. Are you happy now? _Soren thought. _Get the corpse out of my sight. _He couldn't bear to look at the body, at Lethe's dead, accusing eyes staring back up at him, any longer.

Soren stood up and turned to walk away when something caught his leg. Then something pounced on his back and knocked him to the ground!

"I often pretend to be dead to gain an extra advantage when outnumbered and overpowered or to catch enemies off-gaurd, and I've become quite adept at it" Lethe hissed, still very much alive and now digging her claws into Soren's ankles and shoulders. "In this case I did it just to toy with you. I'm betting the look on your face right now is priceless. Now you're going to tell me why you'd try to kill me like that, you're going to tell me right here and now, and I'm not going to even so much as get off your back to let you breath properly until you do so."


	30. Chapter 29

At long last, I've finally played Radiant Dawn! I know I said I wouldn't do that until this fic was finished, but the temptation proved too much for me. About Radiant Dawn: it's flipping awesome! The graphics look great, and the improved battle animations are much more engaging. Horse-mounted units charge onto the screen and strike their foes in what can only be described as a Medieval drive-by. After defeating an enemy characters perform a victory pose. Multiple attack animations keep things interestign and fresh. The new weapons and classes and ability to get more use out of weapons (ie the Iron Sword now being good for 50 uses rather than 45) is also a nice, helpful touch. The rich storyline also gave me a better idea of who **not **to kill off in this fic.

However, the new Support system is rather complicated and just a little bit confusing. That's really my only complaint. All FE fans, go out and buy/rent/borrow from a friend this game ASAP. If you haven't played it yet, you don't know what you're missing.

Now on with BR.

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Soren told Lethe everything, from the vision of her and Ike's child to his persuasion by Ashnard just moments ago to kill her.

"And why, may I ask you, did you give into the temptation so easily?" Lethe questioned. "Why did you allow a demon to persuade you to commit murder? Why didn't you argue and deny? Did the monster even promise you anything for doing away with me?"

"No, it didn't promise me anything," Soren answered. "I didn't want to do it, and I don't know why I did."

"Whether you wanted to or not, you still tried to murder me and get nothing in return for it. You're guilty as charged. I have half a mind right now to tear you apart here and tell Ike what you tried to do, and that I killed you out of self-defence," said Lethe.

"Go ahead, do it. I wouldn't blame you,"

"However, there is a way I could let you go with your reputation and your physical being intact," Lethe continued. "You have to promise me something, and I'll be holding you to this promise."

"…What do you want?" Soren inquired. Lethe whispered into his ear. "…Oh no, I can't do that! …No, I'm sorry, I can't do that."

The cat's claws dug deeper into the mage's flesh. "Oh, yes you can," she snarled.

"Fine! I promise, I'll do… I'll do _that_," Soren agreed.

"Very well. I'll tell Ike nothing of what you've done here, and you'll not cause me any more trouble," Lethe said, getting off of Soren's back and returning to human form, "and you'll do as you've promised. First of all, however…" She reached into the mage's robe, pulled out all his tomes, crumpled them up, and put them in her satchel. "You'll get those back once we've reached Daein."

After regaining some of his strength, Ike made his way back to where Zihark and Natasha awaited. However, Zihark was the only one there. Natasha was gone, and Zihark lay crumpled against a boulder, still alive but badly wounded, his eyes focused on a bronze locket on the ground next to his face. Finally the Swordmaster looked up at Ike.

"We were attacked," Zihark said weakly, dragging himself into a sitting-upright position. He winced and groaned in pain at his grievous wound, a leg so mutilated a shard of bone poked out through the flesh of his ankle. "It came at us from over the hill. There was nothing I could do to stop it. It took Natasha and…" He stopped suddenly, looking back down at the locket. "…Alria…"

"Who?" Ike had never heard of this Alria.

"I've never told you this Ike, but I'm actually from Daein," Zihark explained. "I was born and raised there, making it seem all the more odd that I'd be so devoted to befriending and protecting laguz, I'd imagine. Up until about ten or eleven years ago, I was a typical Daein citizen. As you may or may not know, Daein had waged several small civil wars against Gallia in the past. I'd taken part in one of these, and almost as soon as I stepped on the battlefield during the second or so skirmish, I was struck down and left for dead by Gallian forces. I'd admit even then, I was in awe at the grace and raw power the laguz fight with. I lay there, bloodied and battered, for several hours, full expecting that I'd soon be dead, that an enemy soldier would come back and finish me off. I blacked out an hour or so after the battle ended."

Ike said nothing. He let Zihark tell his story without interruption. He did, however, dig though his satchel to find an elixir (a highly effective healing potion that can be recognised by the blue vial it is kept in) to help Zihark with his wound.

"One of my foes had taken pity on me, however. I awoke in a cabin in the Gallian wilderness, being nursed back to health by a laguz girl named Alria. I don't think I ever told her I was Daein, or much about myself other than my name, which she basically had to interrogate me for. The prejudice I was raised with made me ridiculously wary of her. So much that I don't even know what in the heck I thought she'd be able to do to me if she knew too much about me. In time, I became quite attached to her, and in more time, became quite infatuated by her. How fortunate she felt the same way about me. For a while we were in the Laguz Emancipation Army together before I came to the realization that we couldn't be together. I left her, and I've never heard a thing about her since."

"What about the locket, then?" Ike asked, handing Zihark the elixir.

"I gave her that locket when I left her. And yet, here the locket is, wet and slimy after a giant snake spits it out at me," Zihark answered. "You figure it out." He chugged the elixir down and stared blankly into the trees.

"…I'm sorry," Ike said after a momentary silence.

"No, don't you apologise. Unless you fed her to that damned thing yourself, don't you apologise." Zihark's voice was now shaking a bit as he spoke. The wound on his leg was slowly closing up and healing, with the broken bone puncturing the skin sliding back into place.

"I think she went this way," a voice said suddenly in the bushes.

"Dammit Sain, man up! There's nothing here but us," another voice bellowed.

Eliwood, Hector, and Sain appeared out of the forest.

"Ike! So glad to see you!" Eliwood exclaimed. "Our _guide _has abandoned us. Again."

Ike largely ignored them, focused more on Zihark. "Where's Soren?" he asked.

"He said he dropped something a ways back," Zihark replied, pointing the way Soren went through the foliage. Without a word, Ike headed out in that direction, with neither a "thank you" to Zihark, or a "hello" to Eliwood's company. He hadn't a single more moment to lose with this group.

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_Well, that was a bit rude of Ike. So Gigatron has finally roused himself to play _Radiant Dawn_, and now that he's gotten a taste he's probably going to go back for the rest of the beehive before the rest of this fic is finished. Or maybe he'll just go back and play _Transformers: the Game _instead. Either is equally likely._

_By the way, it is actually revealed in _RD _that Zihark is Daein, so rest easy knowing that wasn't something Gigatron just cooked up himself._

-Ranulf


	31. Chapter 30

_As one could expect of him, Gigatron was up half the night yesterday playing _Radiant Dawn. _Hey, it's better than that other game. "Okay, need to re-center the camera for the billionth time… Oh crud, I hear a bad guy transforming but I can't see him, where is he? Dammit, don't blow up the bus, Bumblebee, there's a Decepticon right next to you! Beat him up instead before he- 'MISSION FAILED'"_

_For those concerned, Lethe is out of rehab now, although upon seeing that she was nearly killed by Soren, of all people, she'll likely cause Gigatron horrible pain and then OD again. Never mind that, though. Here' chapter 30._

-Ranulf

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Ephraim, Erika, and Saleh had lost track of Amelia. It was most likely that she had recovered emotionally from Duessel's death, and with her inquisitive nature had noticed something the others hadn't and silently stopped to check it out. Still, a young girl with only limited combat experience, fairly frail armour, and rather weak weaponry would be easy prey for a hunting party of giant snakes.

Amelia had indeed noticed something the others hadn't and had indeed stopped to investigate without telling them. About a half-hour before Ephraim noticed she had disappeared, the quartet had crossed a small clearing in the forest, Erika trying to make sense of the map Ike had scribbled for them while Soren was busy with the records.

"I think that little square thing is supposed to be a town," Erika speculated.

"Must be, it has a name next to it," said Ephraim.

"It seems the little squares with the scribbles next to them are towns, the wavy circles are lakes, and the splotches are mountains and forests." Saleh tried to interpret Ike's illiterate gibberish. That was when Amelia saw something long and white slithering through the grass about fifty feet away. Normally, Amelia would have used common sense and stayed away, following her companions. But there was something about this object. It seemed to glow faintly, looking like a long, thin cloud slowly sliding along the ground. There was something hypnotic about it. Amelia was drawn to it, leaving the safety of her comrades to approach it.

Once she was within about ten feet of it, the object froze. Amelia could now make out its scaly, snow-white skin. Then, something reared out of the underbrush- its neck and head. The serpentine creature was around forty feet long, revealing its true size as it slithered out of the grass towards Amelia. Its head was triangular and its face and neck were covered in various colourful markings, and its frill of short spikes seemed to be made of diamonds.

Amelia's first instinct was to run. This creature could very well be another basilisk- who was to say how many of them there were by now? But something stopped her. A voice in her head- this creature was talking to her.

"Don't be afraid," it said in a soothing female voice, "please don't run away, little girl." Amelia didn't say anything in response. She only back away slowly. In a moment, she'd turn tail and run back to Ephraim and the others. But something kept her held in place. Her mind almost completely shut down as the serpent slithered closer to her with unnatural grace.

Soren wandered alone through the forest. Lethe had sent him away to blindly roam about while she went back to Eliwood and company. She at least gave him his Elwind tome to defend himself with, but was quick to chase him away after he received it. Now the mage was alone, and after his long argument with Lethe to win back his equipment, a bit tired and disoriented. For all Soren knew, he was staggering back to the HQ, or possibly right into the waiting jaws of a basilisk.

Soren finally regained a partial sense of direction when his eyes beheld a peculiar sight: A grassy clearing in the woods revealed a huge white serpent- or a small white basilisk, whichever way you want to put it- was coiling itself around a seemingly hypnotized Amelia, who stared blankly as the demon wrapped itself around her and dragged her to the ground.

_They even attack children? _Soren thought with disgust. He quickened his pace, grabbing for his Elwind. This was not only his chance for redemption, but also a chance to get back on the right trail if Amelia's companions were nearby. However, once he was within range to attack this demon with the tome, he froze. The basilisk looked at him with its eyes. Soren recognised those eyes: they were Natasha's.

"By Ashera, what's happened to you?" Soren said under his breath. The Natasha-basilisk released Amelia and slithered towards the mage.

"Dearest Soren," the demon said in a voice that all too well resembled Natasha's, "you come to with intentions of violence? This is not your girl I threaten, is it? If not, why would you try to protect her?"

Soren did not reply at first. He only pulled out the tome and readied it. "I cannot allow you to harm anyone, much less a child who cannot defend herself," he said at last.

The serpent reared up, hissing venomously, prepared to attack. "Did you not love me when I was one of your kind?!" it questioned. Now was as good a time as any for Soren to do something he'd always wanted to do, but never could because there was always someone around to ruin the mood by acting surprised at this out-of-character act.

"Regardless of past feelings," Soren said as dramatically as he could, "honey, you got real ugly." Then the mage unleashed the fury of Elwind again, this time on a creature that deserved it. But the monster seemed to resilient to magic; its reaction consisted only of enraged hissing and striking wildly at the air, before slithering away into the forest. With the creature's departure Amelia was freed from the trance that held her. At the same time, Ephraim, Erika, and Saleh stepped out into the clearing, having heard the commotion and now seeing the grass and dirt the magic had throw in all directions.

"Soren?" Ike called as he trekked through the woods. "Lethe?" It had occurred to him that perhaps wandering off alone while several blood-drinking serpent demons were at large was a bad idea, but he had Ragnell in hand and had to find the two whose names he called as quickly as possible. If the assassin failed, Soren may try to take Lethe himself. And if Soren picked a fight to the death with Lethe, that would be one less mage in the world unless Soren got incredibly lucky, in which case that would be one less cat in the world. Finally, he found Lethe wandering through the trees. She seemed to have been looking for him as well, as she weaved in between the trees towards him.

"Lethe! Thank the Goddess I found you!" Ike beamed. "Soren hired an assa…"

"I know all about it," Lethe cut him off, skidding to a stop before Ike and shifting into her human form. "Not to worry though, I took care of that."

"Good to know, but I fear Soren may try it himself now," Ike continued.

"Oh no, don't worry about that," Lethe assured him. "No need to worry about that at all."

"Then why are you so beaten up?" asked Ike. True, Lethe's tunic was slightly torn around the skirt and sleeves, her hair was a bit ruffled, and there was dirt staining her face.

"I was attacked on my way here by one of the basilisks," Lethe said, quickly covering Soren's tracks. "But I fought it off with relative ease. Where are the others?"

A moment later, Zihark led Eliwood, Hector, and Sain down the trail after Ike. "Is it common Tellius etiquette to leave your lost guests alone in the middle of a demon-infested forest?" Hector asked.

"And at long last we've relocated you," Eliwood said to Lethe.

"I apologise for abandoning you earlier, but I had very important business to attend to," Lethe retorted.

"I have the same excuse," Ike added.

"Very well, then. Let us find the Magvellians and Soren," said the Pharae noble.


	32. Chapter 31

_Well, he can always say a magical fairy came along and poofed them all back to life at the end of the fic, can't he?_

_Haar and Bastian, although they died in BR, are still very much alive and well in _Radiant Dawn_. So either Gigatron DOES allow a magical fairy to come along and poof them all back to life, or what we have here is a continuity problem the likes of which our mortal plane has never seen before._

_Anyway, the fic is quickly coming to an end. There's about three or four chapters left before its done and Gigatron moves on to other projects. It was fun while it lasted, wasn't it? Aside from Soren being a treacherous douche bag? Well, at least he made an effort to redeem himself in the previous chapter._

-Ranulf

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"I swear, we need to put a cowbell around that girl's neck," Ephraim announced as he, Erika, and Saleh backtracked to find Amelia. The Renais Prince sometimes fantasized of a perfect world where curious and mischievous children wore cowbells around their necks to prevent them getting lost. He'd have to make that royal decree when he got back to Magvel. Only if Erika would allow that, of course, and most likely, she wouldn't. The prince could only dream...

Amelia stared at Soren with inquisitive eyes. "You... You saved me..." she managed to say, still recovering from the hypnosis.

"Indeed I did," Soren replied. "Were you here alone or are your companions nearby?"

"Saleh and the twins? Last I saw them they were over by those boulders over there." Amelia pointed to a rock formation, the formation where she first broke away from her comrades. As Soren averted his gaze there, by some fortunate coincidence the other Magvellians were just appearing from behind the mounds of rock.

Erika spotted the two up ahead. "There she is!" the princess announced. "Ike's mage friend is with her." Before anyone could approach or say anything more, however, huge shadows rained down from the sky as the beating of wings filled the air! All looked up, and all who looked up were greeted with a true sight to behold: Wyvern riders and pegasus knights filled the sky: Begnion forces, from the look of it. The soldiers and their steeds were clad in full armour, and the riders wielded bows and lances. One particularly large wyvern had a ballista mounted on its back. The pegusi all had small red sacks hanging from their armour with thin cables.

That was not all that came. War horses came from the trees, pulling ballistae and catapults behind them, escorted by dozens of paladins, outfitted with steel axes mounted on long poles. They thundered across the clearing, leaving dust clouds and such in their wake. Once the army was gone, Amelia and Soren hurried over to the others.

"Glad to see your alright, Amelia." Ephraim spoke first. "Although it would be nice if you wouldn't wander off without telling us. Keep that up and I'll make you wear a cowbell."

"An excellent way to raise a child. Force her to wear something meant to keep track of livestock," Soren said sarcastically. "Has anyone here seen the others?"

"We haven't seen anything but trees and rocks for hours now," Erika reported.

"And about the soldiers who just came through?" brought up Saleh.

"That was Begnion, I'd guess. We'd best stay out of their way," answered Soren.

"I'll send a flare," Saleh announced. He raised an open hand to the sky, and a miniature whirlwind of fire swirled around it. Then a ball of flames shot from his palm up into the sky and exploded into a halo in the clouds. Such a flare could have been seen by anything above ground in a 12-mile radius. The flagging was a success. Ike and the others saw the signal.

"Must be Saleh," Eliwood speculated.

"In that case we'd do well to head in that direction about now," Hector added. "Are you coming Sain, or has your spine finally collapsed in on itself?"

Sain had his eyes fixed, looking just past Hector. He was a pale as snow was white, and he was slowly readying his lance to throw. "Get down," he said quietly. Instead, Hector looked behind him. The Natasha-basilisk was reared up and ready to strike! Hector ducked out of the way as Sain javelin-tossed the lance at the serpent, but it dodged and lunged back at him before anyone could react!

But before the monster's fangs could reach their target, Ike drew Ragnell, and then, in what could only be called an epic manoeuvre, decapitated the attacking basilisk in midair! The headless body fell to the dirt like a stone, but the severed head flew through the air and right into Sain's face. There was a stillness and silence for a moment before Sain stumbled away and emptied the contents of his stomach behind a tree. Once he regained his composure, they set out to the site signalled by Saleh's flare.

The Begnion army surrounded Lake Crimea. That was where the scouts specified the basilisks were last seen. The catapults and ballistae were moved into position, ready to fire everything they had into the water as soon as something arose. The wyvern riders and pegasus knights circled the sky above, looking down at the calm surface of the lake. To think the last confirmed sighting of these horrid demons was in this peaceful body of water. The paladins formed a circle around the lake, a living barricade of horse and rider, armour and axe, so tight that nothing would be able to get past being noticed.

One paladin had fallen asleep, hunched over on his steed with his poleaxe hanging loosely from his fingers. His comrade next to him lightly poked the sleeping soldier with the end of his weapon. "Nikolas," the wake paladin called, "Nikolas, this is no time to be sleeping!"

Nikolas's eyes fluttered open as he snapped to attention. "Is the monster here?!" he questioned.

"No, but it could show up at any moment! Stay alert," his ally warned.

"Sorry, Barth, it's only that even this chaffing saddle is a more comfortable place to sleep than those damn bunks," Nikolas complained.

Barth rolled his eyes. A veteran from the previous year's war on Daein, he was ashamed to serve the same army as whining, inexperienced whelps like Nikolas. Once upon a time, men were sent to war, men who never complained and did all they possibly could to destroy their enemies and protect their homelands, not boys who lacked motivation and skill.

Barth had a son and two grandchildren back in Begnion. The little ones always wanted to hear his war stories, and the aging paladin was more than happy to share his tales of battle. He loved seeing their eyes go wide with awe at his exploits as a Calvary Commander in the Begnion army. Barth also loved to face challenging opponents. When he was consulted by General Zelgius himself to head out to Crimea and fight a monstrous serpent terrorizing the entire continent, he was more than happy to comply. It was as boring as one could ever imagine simply sitting around his son's store in the marketplace. He was one of the few men who could say he felt entirely comfortable in heavy armour, sitting atop a galloping steed for hours on end.

Suddenly, an explosion sounded in the distance. Cries came from the forces surrounding the lake. This was it. The monster had come. _Grandfather, tell us a story. _The paladins turned their steeds around to face the lake. Already, the army was in ruins. Pegusi and wyverns were being pulled out of the sky by dozens of clawed tentacles and devoured by a gaping maw that looked like a huge pit of spikes as their riders were flung off and to their deaths. The basilisk had shown itself, and neither the catapults nor ballistae seemed to be stopping it. The pegasus knights cut the cables holding the red bags. The crimson sacks fell and exploded into a shower of flames upon contact with the demon's skin, but this hardly fazed it.

Their efforts to fell this abomination were only angering the creature as its flailing tendrils rent at the air and tore apart any wyverns or pegusi that flew too close. An echoing bellow, an eardrum shattering noise that sounded not unlike a foghorn, emitted from the basilisk's mouth. This roar seemed to shake the very world to its core. It certainly shook every one of the soldiers to their core, even Barth. Then, clouds of dust began to erupt from the ground, and a moment later something burst from the ground beneath a ballista, sending the contraption sailing through the air as though it were merely a feather! There were now two basilisks annihilating the Begnion army!

Ashnard looked with maddened glee at the devastation he and Grave Digger were causing. The former took care of anything in the air or on the shoreline, while the latter destroyed anything out of reach of Ashnard's tentacles. Lake Crimea was now a giant, bubbling cauldron, from the bombs carried by the now dead pegasus knights falling into the water and detonating. Grave Digger sent the catapults and ballistae hurtling through the air at the paladins. Most had fled. But a few brave men, Barth among them, and stayed and fight. Most of them were now dead.

A pulsating, beaked tongue sprang out of the ground and bit into Barth's steed, knocking him off of his steed to the earth below. The horse's dying whinnies rang in his ears along with the explosions and roars. He pulled himself up and readied his poleaxe as a huge orange beast like a centipede rose from the softened dirt before him, its antennae flailing wildly like huge, segmented whips. It spotted Barth and lunged at him the paladin, mandibles opened wide.

_Grandfather, tell us a story..._

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_What the hell, Intelligent Systems? Just, what the hell?_

_This is Lethe. Yeah, I know Ranulf is supposed to be musing the remainder of the fic, but I had to say this: I look like a bloody deformed stoner in _Radiant Dawn. _My ears are too big and pointy, and my face looks like I'm just recovering from one hell of a drug trip. Granted, I WAS on the nip when my portrait was taken, but still... All in all, it looks more like bad fan art of me rather than my official picture in the game._

-Lethe


	33. Chapter 32

_Guess who's in _Radiant Dawn _as a playable character?_

_Lyre here. Gigatron allowed me to muse this chapter to voice my excitement. However, my appearance in this fic barely resembles my appearance in the game, so Gigatron will be scrambling for a reason for my sudden change of attire and hairstyle in his next _FE _fic. Yes, I'm in that too. I'm getting into everything now. _

_What can I say? The public loves me._

-Lyre

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"They should be just past this rock formation," Lethe announced, leading Ike and the others through the winding forest pathway. "But I can smell the basilisks nearby, as well. We'd better hurry. Tread lightly, remember."

"Hey, I think I see... Yes, there they are!" Erika said to her group, spotting the glinting yellow bells on the ends of Lethe's scarf, and then the golden glow of Ragnell in Ike's hands. Soren was horribly nervous. Would Ike question him? Had Lethe said anything of the mage's treacherous mistake?

"Soren! There you are!" said Ike as he approached. Soren braced himself. "...Did you go mute in my absence?" Ike asked a moment later after Soren didn't respond. No questioning about attempted murder? The mage was relieved beyond words.

"No, I can still speak," Soren replied at last. "Now that we're regrouped, we should get back on the topic of getting to Daein."

"And let's not split up this time," Ephraim suggested. "We almost lost Amelia last time we did that."

"But if we don't, we'll be easier for the basilisks to find," Hector reminded. "Just put a cowbell around the girl's neck."

"See Erika? I'm not the only one who thinks the best way to keep children out of trouble is to give them cowbells!" Ephraim exclaimed.

"Cowbells...?" Lethe gave the Renais prince a questioning look.

"Yes. Cowbells. That shouldn't seem so strange to you. You're wearing bells on your neck right now," Ephraim retorted.

"Touché," replied Lethe. Just then, her face contorted with disgust. "The serpents are moving in. That's our cue to hurry up."

Too late. Grave Digger reared his head out of the ground nearby. Chunks of fetid meat and armour could be seen stuck in his mandibles as the demon shrieked at the group.

"A centipede," Saleh said with disgust, "it just had to be a centipede, didn't it? I _hate _centipedes!" He summoned another whirlwind of fire around his hand, and after ordering everyone to back away and get down, hurled the inferno that had formed in his palm at the approaching demon, scuttling at them on hundreds of blade-like legs. Grave Digger was struck head on, and upon the impact of the fire ball, exploded into a shower of flames, shattered exoskeleton, and pale yellow blood! The last child basilisk was no more.

But that wasn't the last of their troubles. "Unless you can do that again on a much larger scale, Saleh, we'd best leave now. The parent's coming now," Lethe announced. Everyone snapped to attention and roused themselves to move out. Again, too late. The basilisks seemed one step ahead now. Ashnard's tendrils began to shoot out of the tall grass like clawed, writhing daisies! They seemed most focused grabbing Ike, Eliwood, and Ephraim! Despite a valiant effort on everyone's parts to fight the tentacles off, the attacked trio were dragged into the ground and to parts unknown.

Ike awoke stuck to an icy cold stone wall with some kind of webbing, an ugly shade of puke green in colour. He recognized the place: it was the throne room of Daein Keep. Only now, it was dark and cold, covered in the webbing, cocoons decorating the walls and ceilings. The place stunk of decay and disrepair. Struggling a bit, he found the webbing was rather weak, and soon managed to free himself. Time to investigate this hellhole. His first priority was to find out what was in the cocoons.

Ike approached the cocoon nearest to him. He stuck his fingers into the slime-like webbing, and brushed the outer layer away slowly. There were many thick, heavy layers, so he could only remove them slowly. Slowly, so very slowly, he removed the layers, until he reached the last few strands of webbing.

Ike removed the last couple of strings, and then saw what the cocoons contained.

The dead, pale face of one of the Crimean soldiers who engaged the basilisk in Malthrowin stared back, eyes and mouth opened wide in a last expression of terror and agony, forever frozen onto the poor soul's face! Ike felt a noise rising in his throat, a scream that became stuck as it tried to leave his mouth and came out instead and a choked gasp. He stumbled back, away from the cocoon, and began to feel violently ill. He felt faint, and the room began to spin.

_Get a hold of yourself, _Ike told himself, _pull yourself together! What you need to do now is find Eliwood and Ephraim._

Right, yes. Eliwood. Ephraim. Must find. Ike regained his composure and left the throne room- making sure to be slow and cautious. He didn't want to end up in one of these cocoons. Just then, one of the cocoons moved. Perhaps something was alive in one? Had there been someone spared this horrible fate? Ike rushed to the shaking cocoon and opened it up as quickly as possible. A beak-like nose stuck out through the last layer, and behind the last few strands of webbing were a pair of narrowed eyes. Ulki, still alive inside the cocoon, gasped for breath! Ike cut the pod open and helped him out.

"Ulki! What the hell happened to you?" Ike asked.

"Janaff and I... We were doing a scouting mission over Daein... We were looking for a Beast Tribe girl who went missing there earlier that day..." Ulki spoke in between deep breaths. "She had a package that she was to give to Janaff and I, and we'd then deliver it to Tibarn. We never found her. Instead, we found a hole in the snow of enormous size. Of course, Janaff had to investigate, and that was when we were attacked by... something. I just awoke now, so anything that happened past that point I wouldn't know about."

"What was the package?" questioned Ike.

"Tibarn told Janaff and I quite sternly not to speak of anyone of the package's contents. That wouldn't be too difficult, considering he never actually told us," Ulki replied.

"Must be important then. Come on, I'll help you get out of here," Ike offered. Ulki was in no position to deny his help, and thus gladly accepted.

Ephraim and Eliwood found themselves jammed together in a stuffy, foul-smelling, puke green pod. After an immense effort, they managed to struggle free, and fell face-first onto a hard stone floor. For a moment or two they gasped for breath, before they spoke.

"Soap, Ephraim!" Eliwood exclaimed. "You're a prince, use soap more often, dammit!"

"I could say the same to you, or I could assume that was whatever we were in," Ephraim retorted. "Where are we?"

"Well, judging from the webs and cocoons everywhere, the stench of death and fear in the air, and the dark, scary atmosphere, I'd say we're in the monster's lair," Eliwood speculated.

"Why would it bring us to its lair?" Ephraim wondered, inspecting Siegmund and noticing that Eliwood still had Durandal. "We're the only ones who can kill it. Perhaps it's challenging us?"

"Maybe. But first, let's find Ike."

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_Ulki lives! The world can sigh in relief knowing that he wasn't eaten. Gigatron was a bit flustered to find Lyre was now a character in _RD,_ because that meant he could have gotten her personality and appearance all wrong. So far, he's definitely not gotten her looks right, so as Lyre said earlier, he'll have to fix that double-quick._

_Further more flabbergasting him is that he's just now realizing how highly I rank in the Gallian army. Gigatron, here's an idea: start paying more attention during the cut scenes. _

_By the way, either out of boredom or ambition, Gigatron scripted out the entire plot for his next FE fic _Iceheart yesterday. Rest easy knowing the narrative for that one won't be as sloppy as the narrative for BR._  
_

-Ranulf


	34. Chapter 33

_Lyre was a bit dismayed at her portrayal in _Radiant Dawn_, one could say. _

_Lyre can be heard in the background, asking no one in particular "why am I such a bitch all of a sudden?"_

_Gigatron has his work cut out for him transitioning the friendly, calm Lyre from BR into the sassy loud-mouth she is in RD if he hopes to keep her in-character continuity._

_But why are we talking about Lyre so much now, any way? We're not into _Iceheart _yet, this is still _Basilisk's Reign. _Though about _Iceheart, _you wouldn't believe some of the stuff Gigatron has in store for that. I hope he realizes how silly the idea of laguz that turn into giant crocodiles and dinosaurs is. I can't say any more about it though, or he may fire me. That's no good if he fires me._

_Lyre can again be heard in the background, asking (again no one in particular) "I have a pink tunic now? A _pink _tunic?! What the hell kind of stereotypical bullshit IS this?!!"_

_Hm, it seems her portrayal in RD may not be as drastically different as I first thought..._

-Ranulf

_--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------_

Ike had been in Daein Keep a year ago during Ashnard's war. He also remembered what his father wrote about it in his journal.

"Ashnard had a secret passage to his room of worship hidden in the dungeon. Tauroneo had once taken this passage by pressing the blade of his lance into a crack in the floor. The eastern wall of the dungeon slid open and revealed a stairway, which led down to the shrine." That was what Ike's father had written in his journal. He escorted Ulki to the castle gates. As he turned to leave, the hawk asked him, "Aren't you leaving, as well?"

"No. Not yet," Ike answered. "I've got business to attend to. Tell Tibarn I said 'hi'."

The moats in the Keep's interior no longer ran with water, but instead a thick, oily liquid. The entire castle was covered in the webbing, and the cocoons were everywhere the eye could see. Some had huge puncture marks in them, and were brown and rotting. It was clear what had been done with these ones. The Daein flags hanging from the ceiling were ripped and torn to shreds that now littered the floor. Nothing Ephraim had seen even in the war against Fomortiis's demon armies was as harrowing and chilling as this. A nearly overpowering sense of dread constantly ate at his and Eliwood's nerves. Lesser men would likely have gone mad with fear.

"Hold up a moment," Eliwood said suddenly. "Is that..? Yes, there's Ike now."

"Wonderful. Strength in numbers, you know," said Ephraim.

"You two are here too, huh?" Ike inquired as he approached them.

"We were. I don't want to be here any longer than needed, so let's hurry and kill this damn snake," Ephraim replied.

_Ah, so these are the brave heroes they've been made out to be,_ the demon thought as he lay coiled in his den beneath the Keep. _They're searching for me. They're looking for a fight. Rest assured, gentlemen, I will give you a fight._

"We need to get to the dungeons," Ike instructed. "There's a secret passage there, apparently. Once we're in the dungeon, look around for a crack in the floor. Once you've found it, push you blade into it. The eastern wall should open to reveal a stairway."

"How do you know all this?" Eliwood asked.

"Dead father told me," Ike said simply. He couldn't be praised for his intellect. Ephraim and Eliwood just played along with it.

"You're not going anywhere without me," a voice suddenly called out behind them. They all whipped around, half-expecting a new basilisk to lunge at them, and were instead greeted with the sight of Lethe running down a hallway towards them!

"Lethe?! How did you get here?" Ike questioned.

"I followed the creature. It seems we were right on Daein's border when it attacked," Lethe explained. "Oh, and the Begnion army is coming to blow up the castle."

"What? Why?!"

"We told them everything you told us. They figure the only way to resolve this is to trap the basilisk in its hole and drop fireballs on it. They'll be here in about five hours."

"They may be right. All we have to do is exit the Keep and watch the fireworks," Eliwood commented.

"Remember what Saleh said. It really all depends on the magical finesse of the mage casting the spell. If they're too weak, they won't be able to kill it," Ephraim said grimly. "I fear the task is still up to us."

"BUT, maybe the mages WILL be powerful enough, and therefore, the task ISN'T up to us," Eliwood retorted. "Just speculation, though."

"But still, we should at least do a number on the thing and let them finish it off," Ephraim bargained.

"Lethe, you'd best get out of here," said Ike. "If they're dropping fire on this place, you don't want to be here when they do so. Besides, it's not like you can help us slay the basilisk."

"...Very well, then. But I did find this map of the Keep." Lethe handed him a scroll.

"Thanks. Where'd you find it?" Ike asked.

"Under the mat at the castles gate." Lethe said no more as she left. Sure enough, the scroll had a map of Daein Keep written on it. They followed the map to the dungeon, and once they reached the dungeon they found a crack in the floor after some searching. Ephraim jabbed Siegmund into it, and the eastern wall slid open. This was quite simple so far.

Perhaps too simple. The trio descended the steep, dark stairway. At the bottom of the stairs was a long, dank corridor that looked not unlike a shallow sewer canal. Mud and sludge hidden by the pale green water grabbed at their feet and slowed their advance, and noxious odours burned their noses, but still the three soldiered on. Then, Ike saw one of the most noteworthy things his father had written in his journal.

"Tauroneo gave me some very alarming news today. He followed Ashnard- I refuse to call this maniac 'his Majesty' or 'his Highness'- into the dungeon and down the hidden stairway, and discovered the secret Ashnard held there was a shrine to the Fomortiis. King Daein worships the Demon King! The shrine was soaked in blood, no doubt from virgin sacrifices or some other madness, and behind it was a lake of some kind of acid. One soldier questioned Ashnard, according to Tauroneo, and so the Mad King had him thrown into this venom," so read the entry in Greil's journal.

The shrine itself consisted of a short, wide pedestal surrounded by a crescent of tall, brown pyramids, the bases covered in odd-looking runes. All of this was built before a huge statue of the Demon King himself, a clawed, fanged, and horned terror supported by a snake-like lower half. The statue's claws, as well as the alter were covered in what looked like heavy rust, but with a bit of imagination it was easy to figure out that this wasn't rust staining the stone. Behind the statue was a deep pit, at the bottom of which was, as the journal said, a bubbling pit of steaming green acid. It looked like the webbing and the cocoons in texture and colour.

"...The acid seems a bit much, don't you think?" Eliwood commented.

"Perhaps it was a part of the worship? Like a ritual?" Ephraim speculated.

Then, the acid began to bubble more fiercely, and it began to churn and froth as a whirlpool formed in the pool's center! Then, Ashnard reared his head out of the liquid, completely unaffected by the acid!

"Ah, but of course. It's where the monster sleeps," Ephraim concluded.

"So you've found my dirty little secret, have you?" the demon hissed. "The last time the alter tasted blood was a year ago on the night before I left the Keep. And it shall taste blood soon again. First, it will be soaked in your blood. Then will come my annual sacrifices. None shall dare pray to the Goddess after this day; I am this land's god now, and I am only a servant of Fomortiis. But still I shall demand sacrifice. Once a year- let's say on this very day when I kill you fools- a yearly sacrifice will be left in my lair to die. Four youths, one human girl and one human boy; and if the half-breeds must be equal to humans, then so be it, I'll take a boy and a girl from them each year as well."

The trio roused themselves for battle, spreading our around the mouth of the pit. "None shall be sacrificed to you _or_ the Demon King. The only blood staining the alter will be yours!" Ike declared.

"'The only blood staining the alter will be yours!' How amusing. How clichéd! You call yourselves heroes, princes, lords? Pathetic, all of you," the basilisk snarled as it rose from the pit, tendrils flailing wildly in the air. "You will die here! Bow down to your new god and resist no longer, or all of Tellius, Elibe, and Magvel will join you in death!"


	35. Chapter 34

No sooner could the heroic trio retort to Ashnard's threat did the serpent duck its head into the acid most of its body was still submerged in, and suck in a mouthful of the corrosive liquid. Ephraim, the best strategist of the three, saw what their foe was doing, and took action. "Retreat into the hall!" he ordered. When the basilisk reared its head again, acid dripping from it lips, Ike and Eliwood followed the Renais prince into the mud-filled corridor.

A raging stream of green followed the trio as they retreated- acid spewed from the serpent's mouth- and burnt off their capes! This narrow escape awarded them with only a moment to form a battle plan.

"Ike, Ragnell is imbued with magic that allows it to strike from near and far, correct?" Ephraim asked hurriedly.

"Not from too far, but yeah, for the most part," Ike answered, speaking so quickly he slurred some of the words together.

"Eliwood, what about Durandal?" Ephraim questioned.

"No, Durandal is close range only," Eliwood said in a rushed tone as the basilisk's tendrils began to creep into the corridor. Ike noticed them first, and alerted his companions. The sound of blades cutting through rubbery flesh and the demon's pained hissing echoed throughout the hall and shrine room as the green water of the hall began to turn a sickly red. The tentacles retreated-those that were still attached did, at least. A dozen severed tendrils squirmed and flopped about in the filth before becoming still.

"Cowards! You are insults to the heroes of old, hiding away from me! Come out and fight," Ashnard roared. "This realm will burn to dust by my wrath, and your ashes will be blown throughout the ruins, so all will know full well to once again fear the name of Ashnard!"

"Nay, foul vermin! YOU shall burn by our wra..." Eliwood began before Ike silenced him.

"This isn't the time to be stereotypes," Ike said sternly. "This is the time to kick some ass. Ephraim, got a plan?"

"As long as it has that acid, the basilisk can destroy our cover and take away elbow room, so long as we're down here at least," Ephraim strategized. "We need to bring this fight upstairs."

Then the basilisk's four tongues slithered out of its mouth and into the corridor, snapping their beaks at the air, emitting low hisses. One of them lunged at the trio as they ascended the stairs. With a few whacks from Ragnell, Ike nearly cut off the tongue's "head", one could say, and the twitching mouth hung by a few strands of sinew from the writhing stalk before falling off entirely.

Another jet of acid melted the stairs as the three ascended to the dungeon. There was still no time to strategize, however, as the basilisk burst through the floor of the dungeon to get at its foes! Now was as good a time as any to take a stand. Tentacles filled the room, flailing everywhere, crushing the old skeletons shackled to the walls into dust and clawing at the heroes' boots, and the tongues slithered obscenely from the serpent's gaping mouth, the mouthless tongue squirming out of the jaws like a separate entity and flopping onto the floor, trailing out of the maw like a trail of living intestines. Of course; if it didn't have a head, it couldn't draw blood from victims, and therefore was useless and had to be gotten rid of. Either that, or spitting out its own tongue was a tactic the basilisk used to disgust its enemies to the point where their revulsion prevented them from fighting back. If the latter was the case, it was working quite well.

The claws ending off the tendrils dug into the floor and tore up bricks, and then threw the chunks of debris at the trio. Ragnell, Durandal, and Siegmund blocked these projectiles easily enough, as well as did a good job of fending off the tongues and tentacles. Then Ashnard retreated his claws and tongues and lunged sluggishly at them itself! Ike, Eliwood, and Ephraim jumped out of the way of this speeding battering ram of scales and teeth as it rushed past them and smashed through the western well of the dungeon into the castle treasury! A thrashing tail ending in what resembled a huge spiked mace followed the thick, lengthily body of the monster as it propelled itself with a sudden burst of speed into the treasury. It seemed to want to get into the gold-laden room quite badly, so much that it ignored its foes- although the trio still had to duck under its tail club.

Ike peered into the mammoth hole in the wall. The treasury, like the rest of the castle, was dark and dank. _What could it be doing, _he wondered. Was it fleeing? Preparing to lunge at them again? Eliwood and Ephraim peered into the darkness next. Suddenly, something, a yellowish glint, sped through the air and open a fine cut on Ike's temple! Then another object shot out of the gloom, shearing off a lock of Ephraim's hair. They all ducked behind the wall as more projectiles shot out at them. As these projectiles rapidly embedded themselves into the eastern wall and flew into the secret passage, it became apparent what was happening: The basilisk was consuming mouthfuls of the golden coins scattered around the treasury and spitting them out at its opposition! The barrage continue ceaselessly for a while until spectres, various gems, and even entire treasure chests were being hurling out of the treasury as weapons!

"Shouldn't it have run out of ammo by now?!" Eliwood exclaimed more than asked, shouting over the sound of the hurled objects smashing against the walls and the basilisk's taunting shrieks.

"This is Daein keep, remember. The treasury's bound to be enormous!" Ephraim yelled in reply. "We need to get this thing to stop throwing stuff at us long enough to counterattack!"

Then Ike pulled his father's journal out from his cape, opened it, and began to read, to refresh his memory.

"Ike, what are you doing?! This is no time for light reading!" Ephraim scolded.

"Tauroneo often spied on the Mad King on the battlefield, and by doing this, he learned many a surprising thing about Ashnard," the entry in Greil's journal read. "It seemed King Daein has a thing for snakes. Big snakes. A real odd thing for big snakes." No, that's not the right entry. Any fool could see Ashnard liked big snakes now that he had allowed Fomortiis to reincarnate him as one. Ike ducked lower as a small gold statue smashed through the wall above him.

Ah, here it was. "Tauroneo was at it again- spying on Ashnard during battle. And this time, he told me of what seemed to make the Mad King go beet-red with embarrassment..."

"Hey, Ashnard!" Ike shouted during a momentary stop in the barrage. "I hope you didn't forget your tighty-whities!" The barrage now stopped entirely. Ike peered into the treasury. The basilisk was completely still, its red eyes wide, coins falling out of its dangling-open mouth.

"...Tighty-whities?" the demon asked. "Wherever did you hear of me being associated with tighty-whities?"

"Remember when you were human? Many years ago, when you were only just king, a Begnion pegasus knight taunted you about wearing tighty-whities, and you went beet-red with embarrassment," Ike mused. The serpent let out an enraged scream.

"You sneaking, lying scum!" the demon roared. "I'll paint the walls of this castle with your blood! All three of you will have the castle walls painted with your blood! And Ike, your beast-girl? Oh, how I shall make her suffer! Oh, how she shall beg for mer..." The monster was interrupted by Ephraim hurling Siegmund into its thrashing tail. A far cry from the lance piercing the demon's throat, but at least it was a hit.

Now the basilisk was truly pissed. Swiping its tail from side to side, it gained enough velocity to hurl Siegmund back at the humans, and then when the lance missed, followed through by slamming its tail mace into the ground. Debris showered up into the air as the club came down! The floor cracked and all three of the demon's foes were thrown against the northern and southern walls of the dungeon like rag dolls! As Ike slammed against the stone wall, he heard a faint, sickening crack. As he slumped down onto the floor, he looked to his right leg and saw it was broken like a twig that someone had stepped on. Ephraim and Eliwood seemed to be in better shape, but they were pinned down to the floor by debris thrown on them by the advancing basilisk. Once it was satisfied the rubble would hold his comrades in place, the serpent turned its gaze to Ike.

"Remember what I said about your pet?" Ashnard sneered, its mouth again twisting into that horrible smile. "After this, I'm going to hunt her down. Then I'm going to make her bleed. I'm going to kill her slowly and painfully. And you know what the best part is? You get to watch me do it."

Ike found it all too easy to imagine what the basilisk could- and probably would- do to Lethe. The demon's nostrils flared, blowing its rank, hot breath into Ike's face.

"I can smell your fear, human," the monster taunted. "Go ahead. Let it show. Give me satisfaction. Now, how would you like to see your precious sub-human die?"

Ike saw Eliwood and Ephraim pulling themselves out of the rubble. It would take them a minute or two, but he figured he could keep the basilisk distracted long enough for them to ready their weapons and finish it off. Until then, he decided to play along with the serpent's demented game. "I wonder what she'd taste like," he said, tying his own stomach into sickened knots with his own words.

"I'm not going to eat her, if that's what you mean. Not while she's alive, anyway. She'd squirm too much, and that's a very unpleasant feeling, having something moving around in your throat," the basilisk rambled.

"You won't eat her?" said Ike, letting his relief from knowing this thing wouldn't devour Lethe. "Then _EAT THIS!_" Ephraim stabbed Siegmund into the serpent's ribs, while Eliwood jabbed Durandal into the back of its head. Then, in one motion that seemed to take an eternity, Ike swung Ragnell across the reeling monster's neck. Warm navy blue blood showered out of the wound as the magic emitted by Ragnell caused the cut to go much deeper than the blade. Silence and stillness for a moment. Then, the basilisk's head slowly slipped off of its bleeding stump, and both the head and neck fell to the floor with a crash. Ashnard's mad reign of terror was brought to an end once again.

Ephraim removed an elixir from his belt and, careful not to step into the puddle of sticky blood during his approach, handed the vial to Ike. Ike thanked him and quickly chugged the liquid down. Within moments the cut and broken leg began to heal, and after about half a minute of constant regeneration, Ike could walk again. Then the three heroes, victorious over the monster, left Daein Keep. The Begnion armies were still en route to destroy the castle, so that would get rid of the cocoons. Lethe waited for them just outside of the castle gates. She assumed they had slain the beast, since all three of them were covered in its blood. All of them had expected her to have left this place far behind. When asked what she was still doing there, her answer was as one could expect.

"Eliwood and Ephraim, I stayed so I could tell you two you companions are waiting for you at Crimea Harbour. Once you're all aboard, you'll depart for Magvel and Elibe," she explained. "And Ike, you're coming with me. We're going to Gallia. Right now."


	36. Chapter 35

_Here we are, the final chapter of _Basilisk's Reign_. Are you sad it's over? Fear not, for _Iceheart _won't be much different. Not that the fic is drawing to a close, Gigatron would like to thank Aquatic-Idealist for his continued critique, Intelligent Systems for creating _Fire Emblem _to begin with, and everyone who bothered to read past the first chapter. Also, Gallia is apparently Scottish now (you'll see what I mean in a moment), so anyone who doesn't rag on Gigatron for that, I'm sure he'd like to thank you too._

-Ranulf

_------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------_

The calm surface of Loch Gallia was given an orange glow by the setting sun. There were no words Ike knew of that could describe the beauty of this scene. He and Lethe sat beside one another amongst a patch of bramble firs, a type of short, stocky tree found only in Gallia that grows in confusing knots and tangles, which sometimes results in a hidden, secretive retreat for two lovers. However, Ike and Lethe were surrounded by an air of awkwardness. Both were silent and tried to avoid eye contact with each other.

"Why did you bring me here?" Ike asked.

"I just wanted to show you the sunset," Lethe answered, shrugging. "When we were kittens, Lyre and I would sit in this very patch and watch the sun set. Lyre would ask me why the sun sets- she's three years younger than me. I would tell her what our mother told me when I asked her: The sun sets because every night, a giant serpent who lives in the cold sea would drag the sun into the ocean to warm the water, and thus keep itself from freezing to death. In the morning, when the sea was warm again, the serpent would put the sun back up in the sky to warm the land."

"Oh, jeez, please don't talk about snakes right now," said Ike. They both smiled slightly at this remark.

"Ike, I have a question about Soren," Lethe said suddenly. "What would you do to punish him if he, say... Perhaps tried to murder me?"

"I'd beat him senseless and confine him to his quarters for a week or so," Ike replied simply. "Why? _Has _he tried that?"

"Oh no, it was only a hypothetical question. What would Soren have to do to redeem himself in your eyes?" Lethe questioned.

"..I don't know, wear a pink robe and a sombrero while juggling combat knives. Something like that."

"I'd make him spend a night with my sister during her time of month."

"...Excuse me? Her 'time of month'?"

"Yes. I believe the slang term for it is 'in heat'. It's a common thing for Beast Tribe females of her age. And Soren would be stuck right in the middle of it for eight hours."

"Oh, you cruel, cruel cat." Unbeknownst to Ike, Soren _had _attempted to kill Lethe, and was now suffering the consequence of spending a night with a very horny and very kinky Lyre at this very moment. Lethe sighed deeply and watched the glowing orange-yellow orb sink beneath the horizon as if in a trance. Ike scratched his nose.

"Well_ this _is _fun_," the beorc said suddenly. Lethe smiled wider and laid her head on his shoulder, purring softly. Ike blushed as if he were about to spontaneously combust.

"If its like that, then do something," she said sarcastically.

"Imagine if someone saw us right now," said Ike nervously.

"That's saying something, not doing something. And don't worry, nobody knows where we are or what we're doing right now," Lethe assured him.

"_What we're doing_?" Ike asked mischievously, raising an eyebrow.

"Not that we'd be doing anything that anyone would find surprising or unfit, or what-have-you," Lethe said sternly.

"Its so obvious even the monster could see it before it died. Nobody would find it surprising or unfit."

Lethe thought for a moment. They both knew they wanted to, and they both knew they eventually would anyway. With the basilisk's defeat on mind, they might as well do it as congratulations. "I suppose you're right," she said in a somewhat seductive way. She brought herself closer to Ike and pulled off his cape, as he slipped a hand behind her back and untied the strings keeping her tunic on her body. And the rest was history.

Eliwood and Hector stood on the deck as the sun set over Tellius, which slowly disappeared into the distance. Hector balanced Wolf Beil on his shoulder, and Eliwood cleaned the blood and filth from Durandal with a handkerchief.

"Blast it, Eliwood, why don't you just dip the thing into the ocean and let all the little fish come and clean it?" hector questioned. "You've been stroking that blade since we left the harbour!"

"Excuse me for valuing cleanliness," Eliwood shrugged. Sain stood beside them, struggling to open a letter one of the ship's crew had delivered to him as he boarded. Finally, the knight got the envelope open, and read the letter inside.

"Dear Sain,

Remember how you bet me 400 gold that you could get a laguz woman in the same bed as you by midnight? That deal didn't go too well for you, did it? With my newly acquired 400 gold I checked into a fancy inn owned by a laguz family- a father and two daughters. While father dearest slept that night, his two lovely little kittens showed me how much of a good first impression I made on them. That will be 800 gold, please.

Yours truly, Matthew."

"Sain? Are you alright?" Hector asked, seeing the look on Sain's face.

"...I know found out where Matthew is," Sain announced lamely.

Princess Erika slept in her cabin aboard the _Stellar Wasp_. The covers of her cot were pulled up over her head, leaving her feet exposed. In the next cabin, Amelia slept, snoring louder than a girl of her size and age ever would be expected to. Up above, on the ship's deck, Ephraim, Saleh, and Seth talked.

"Honestly Seth, where _were _you that whole time? Its like you magically disappeared from existence!" Ephraim exclaimed.

"We could have used your help," Saleh added, more calmly.

"I told you, I was guarding Castle Crimea," Seth defended himself. "You still killed the thing, didn't you?"

Ephraim calmed himself down. "Yes, we did. As Saleh said, we could've used your help, but we still slayed the beast. But keep in mind, Queen Elincia _did _have most of the Crimean army protecting her. You still could of lent us your assistance without consequence."

"True enough. So tell me, what was this 'basilisk' like?"

"You don't even want to know," Ephraim replied, recounting the final battle with the creature.

As a man lives, he can be great or lame, worshipped or scorned. As a man lives, he can be a hero or a villain. He could be good or evil, or possibly the rare case of good hidden beneath evil, or evil hidden beneath good. Both good men and evil men can create monsters, but only good men can slay these monsters. Thesus and the Minotaur, Beowulf and Grendel, and now, Ike and the Basilisk. Good men and evil men can both share stories with the monsters they slay or create. At the end of a hero or villain's life, they both take solace in the fact that through their stories, or through their monsters, they can live forever.

_**THE END**_


End file.
